Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

For the third time since the previous night, Wylan pinched himself, and it did hurt. Not a lot, but still enough to let him know that none of it was a product of his imagination. It was almost as if he blinked and somehow found himself with a new lover. Not just any lover, but Jesper Fahey. Handsome, smooth, irresistible Jesper Fahey; talented sharpshooter and notorious criminal. The most distracting man Wylan had ever laid his eyes on. And not only had they slept together, twice over, but Jesper also said he wanted to see where things could go with Wylan.

A steep learning curve came with that new reality, however. Jesper might have used his hands and mouth on all the parts of Wylan that mattered, it still didn't mean they knew everything there was to know about each other.

When he and Jesper entered the tailor shop on Garenstraat, a man with an impressive ginger beard greeted them. He recognized Jesper right away and, to Wylan’s utter surprise, started addressing him in Kaelish. “Ùine fada gun fhaicinn, Jesper Fahey! Chuala mi eadhon gu robh thu marbh. Bha ùine chruaidh agam ga chreidsinn.”

“Uill, halò, Dhòmhnaill,” Jesper greeted him back with a chuckle. “You should know by now I'm tougher than that!”

Wylan’s surprise was even greater to hear some kaelish words come out of that mouth. Jesper was like a magician, pulling new rabbits out of his wonky top hat.

The tailor gave Jesper the once over, before he said :“ Chì mi carson a thàinig thu gam fhaicinn. Tha cruaidh fheum agad air rudeigin ùr airson a chaitheamh.”

This had the tone of harmless banter, but Wylan had no clue what was being said.

Dhòmhnaill (that was the tailor’s name, as far as Wylan could gather) then made a head gesture toward him. “Agus cò th' againn an so ?”

Jesper put an arm around Wylan's shoulders and introduced him with a smirk: “This is Wylan, my good friend and personal stylist.”

The man raised an eyebrow and laughed. “Tha thu a’ gabhail a’ phiseag! Tha e ro bhòidheach agus ro dhona air a sgeadachadh gu bhith na aon de na rudan sin!”

Jesper laughed along, and as he did, his hand went down to curl around Wylan's waist instead. “Tha thu ceart.”

“It's a pleasure to meet you, Wylan,” the tailor said in Kerch. “I'll leave you boys to take a look around, and when you need me for anything, just call me. I'll be in the backstore.” He turned on his heels and left them to their own device.

Wylan stared at his companion, still in awe. “Wh-how-where did you learn to speak Kaelish?”

Jesper rubbed the back of his neck. “I don't really speak it. I just know a few useful phrases, much to my Da's eternal dismay. I do understand it quite well, though.”

“Your father’s from the Wandering Isle?” Wylan asked, not doing much to hide his ongoing bafflement.

“Hm, yeah,” Jesper confirmed. He let go of Wylan's waist in order to look through a pile of tweed samples on a table nearby. “It explains why I don't have the most Zemini of surnames.”

How had Wylan not realized this before? Indeed, “Fahey” did not sound like anything originating from Novyi Zem. It sounded more like a surname from Maroch Glen or Istamere. It also explained why Jesper had this unique, milk chocolate skin tone, and freckles on his cheekbones that shined through when the sun warmed his face.

“Have you ever been to the Isle?” Wylan wanted to know.

Jesper shook his head. “No. When my mother and my father met, my Da had been living in Weddle for a while and he had lost contact with his family by then.”

Wylan had a hard time reading Jesper’s expression, or figure out how he felt about his family’s history, so he chose not to press it. If anyone understood how family could be a sensitive subject, it was Wylan. Besides, he had something else in mind. “If you’re half-kaelish, that means you’re allowed to wear kilts, right?”

The smile appearing on Jesper’s lips soon morphed into a bright grin when the meaning of the words sunk in. “Wylan Hendricks?!” he exclaimed. “Am I sensing a fantasy of yours in that innocent question?”

“That question was everything but innocent,” Wylan boasted, his face heating up as he did his best to mimic the naughty quirk of Jesper's mouth.

A bout of fresh excitement shimmered in Jesper's gaze. “Not only am I allowed to wear them, but I happen to adore them! Should we take a look at some?”

“Yes please.”

With a flourish, he invited Wylan to follow him to the other end of the store, to a section where a large rack displayed a variety of kilts in all plaid patterns and color imaginable, along with more neutral ones in different fabrics and pleating types. As Jesper skimmed through at random, Wylan started at one end of the rack, taking a systematic look at each option. Finding the perfect kilt for Jesper was serious business. Jesper had splendid legs ; they were amongst his best features. It would be a sin for him not to flaunt them…not that Wylan had anything to gain from it, of course. He got to the leather options and his mind wandered, imagining Jesper wearing one of these as he spun around, guns blazing in the heat of a shootout ; how it would display the barest glimpse of tone thighs, and enhance the sight of strong calves.

“You seem a bit warm,” Jesper teased, more interested in looking at Wylan than the clothes by now. “Those sweet cheeks are all pink,” he added, poking Wylan’s face in a light, playful manner, which had Wylan blush even harder.

“I don't know what you’re on about,” Wylan muttered. He had to find a diversion, and quickly. “This one,” he declared, grabbing a hanger from the rack. He shoved into Jesper's hands a brown leather kilt with a nice, regular pleating at the hips.

“Yeah?” Jesper asked.

“Yes. It matches your coat.”

Jesper walked to the nearest mirror and Wylan followed. He placed the kilt in front of him, evaluating the effect it had on his silhouette. It didn't take long before he agreed. “I love it too. You have good taste,” he complimented Wylan. He fished the tag from inside the kilt to look at the price and gasped. “And expensive ones too!” He didn't look upset about it, and even planted a kiss of gratitude on Wylan’s cheek. “A man after my own heart.”

The sweetness and familiarity of the gesture set Wylan's heart aflutter and his stomach ablaze.

“I'm gonna tell Dhòmhnaill I'll take this one,” Jesper decided, beaming. He headed for the counter, leaving Wylan to stare at his own flustered reflection in the mirror, the memory of Jesper's kiss, however brief, still branded on his skin. How could this simple thing feel even more intimate than anything they had done between the sheets so far?

You don't deserve it. You don't deserve any of it, Wylan thought. He had to act fast : absorb as much of Jesper's affection into his system as he possibly could, at the risk of overdosing;
bask in every ounce of it, appreciate each second of it because this had a clear expiration date. Soon enough, Jesper would find out how defective he was; how big of a fraud he was… Not some clever, streetwise Barrel boy; not any self-made man like Kaz ; just a rich kid who had made it that far from dumb luck. How could Jesper still have any respect for him, let alone attraction, once he’d discover he was so inadequate his own father thought best to have him strangled and tossed into the canal like a rabid dog.

He locked the guilt up in the very depth of his soul, having no desire to deal with it now. Instead, he helped Jesper select a new, cream colored shirt, a tweed vest and jacket, and a violet tie to complete the look. Finally, Jesper added a pair of thick, violet socks to go with the kilt.

While Dhòmhnaill took measures on Jesper’s shoulders and waist to make the necessary adjustments to the clothes, Wylan passed the time wandering around in the shop, looking at the different pieces on display. He had never harbored any special sentiments regarding clothes in general. The reason was quite simple : he took them for granted for most of his life. Back at the Geldstraat, his father always made sure he wore the best quality outfits – not out of any attachment for his son’s comfort, but because pricy suits served as a pretty wrapping to conceal the poisoned gift Wylan represented for the Van Eck name.

When Wylan ended up in the Barrel, things changed. When his coat got its first unmendable tears; when his shoes got holes and he had to stuff rags into them so he wouldn't get frostbites, Wylan took the measure of the luxury he had grown accustomed to. A woman who worked with him at the tannery took pity, and gave him the clothes of her recently deceased son. Wylan thought he’d cry for joy at the sight of boots with complete soles and shirts with all their buttons.

On a small table in a corner of the shop, a colorful array of neckerchiefs caught his attention. He reached out to feel the light, fluid fabric, wondering when the last time was that he had touched silk.

“It's gorgeous, isn't it?”

Wylan jumped when Jesper spoke, whispering the question directly into the crook of his neck. With a remorseful chuckle and an apology for having startled him, Jesper circled Wylan’s waist from behind and rested his chin on the top of his shoulder, the brim of his top hat tickling Wylan’s left ear. Again; one of those marks of affection that would kill Wylan some day.

“Did you know it's a species of caterpillars that produce silk? They farm them south of Bhez Ju,” Wylan said without thinking. “Don't try to play smart,” he heard his father say, from the darkest crevice of his memory. “The things you learn by heart just to hide the fact you can't read a damn word; they don't count. They never will.” He recoiled, expecting a rebuff.

“No, I didn't know that,” Jesper said instead, with a tilt of his head, as if he had learnt something interesting ; as if he actually appreciated listening to what Wylan had to say. “It makes sense that an insect supposed to turn into a butterfly would make something so delicate and weightless.” His fingers joined Wylan’s in stroking the silken neckties. “Which one's your favorite?“

“Oh. I wasn't looking to buy one. I was just admiring the texture.”

“Well, you should,” Jesper countered. “What about this one?” he asked, touching a blue neckerchief with gray and green patterns. “This color would look lovely on you - it'd bring out the green in your eyes.”

“I have green in my eyes?”

Jesper moved aside and touched Wylan’s chin, tilting his head up to be able to look at him properly. “Hm. Yup! You do,” he confirmed.

This was new information. Wylan had always thought his eyes to be plain, boring brown. Not like Jesper’s, which had streaks of gold and amber that made them so warm.

“But you can choose whichever one you like,” Jesper said, gesturing over the whole display. “My treat!”

Wylan shook his head. That type of quality had to come at a steep price. “No. It’s too much, Jes,” he protested. “It’s very generous of you, but .. I’m sorry. I can't accept it.”

Jesper stepped back, showing the palms of his hands in surrender, but still smiling. “Alright. I will never force you to accept a gift, of course, but be aware I’ll find other ways to pamper you! Just so you wait!”

If that sort of threat was the only kind Wylan had ever gotten in his life, he’d be a way happier man.

“I don't have a lot of work lined up today,” Dhòmhnaill told Jesper, once they joined him back at the counter. “I should be finished with the adjustments in about four bells, if you want to pick everything up later this evening.”

“Good, thank you,” Jesper said, and then turned to Wylan. “That gives us plenty of time to go back to the Dreg's house.”

“By the way, Jesper, there’s a céilí tonight at the Green Dragon if you want to come,” Dhòmhnaill informed him. “And you’re invited too, Wylan, of course.”

“Sure! Why not?” Jesper smiled, exchanging a glance with Wylan. “We’ll see if that's how we want to end our night?”

Wylan offered a polite smile, since he had no idea what he'd just been invited to.

“Midnight? Through the back entrance as usual?” Jesper asked.

“As usual,” the tailor confirmed.

“Feasgar math!” Jesper said, as he headed toward the exit, Wylan on his heels.

“Feasgar math! Chì mi fhathast thu,” Dhòmhnaill greeted back, just before they pushed the door and walked out. Wylan presumed it meant “goodbye, good day, see you later,” something of the sort.

“What is a Kaelly?,“ Wylan asked, once they were outside, strolling at a leisurely pace up the bustling commercial street.

Jesper reached for his hand and linked their fingers together, as if it was the most natural thing in the world for them to walk hand in hand. “A céilí is a traditional kaelish party; very fun; very wild. Kerch shindigs look pretty tame in comparison.”

Wylan wasn't finished satiating his curiosity, however. “When you were speaking with the tailor earlier –when you introduced me – he said something about me. What did he say?”

This time, Jesper threw a laugh at the foggy Ketterdam sky. “He said you were too pretty to be just my friend, and too poorly dressed to be a stylist,” Jesper supplied with a wink.

“I should take that as a compliment, I suppose,” Wylan reflected, “as I don't aim to be fashionable.”

“It's fine, you know,” Jesper reassured him, squeezing his hand. “I much prefer you as a demo man anyway.”

“I'd rather be a musician,” Wylan thought, and maybe, Jesper knew as little about him as he did about Jesper.

They crossed the West Stave on Horen Bridge. Gusts of wind created ripples at the surface of the river and pedestrians threw increasingly worried looks to the sky. A man dressed in mercher black opened his umbrella when they crossed paths with him. The weather had been overcast and foggy for most of the day, but darker, gloomier clouds were rolling in from the harbor.

“I think the weather's about to take a turn for the worse,” Wylan observed.

Jesper said nothing, but he popped the collar of his coat up with his free hand, the other one still firmly holding Wylan's. The cheerful expression he sported earlier had disappeared, and when they reached Baksteenstraat, he looked somber, almost grave.

The Dregs’ house came into view on the other side of the dead-end. Jesper stopped in his tracks and tugged on Wylan's hand, prompting him to stop as well and turn toward him. “Before we go any further, I have to make sure of something,” he stated.

Wylan wasn't sure if Jesper was speaking about their dalliance, or their current walk.

“What we did last night…” Jesper hesitated, shifting his weight from one foot to the other.

“I remember. I was there,” Wylan teased, hoping to lighten the atmosphere somehow. “What about it?”

“You gave me your enthusiastic consent and I'm not questioning it,” Jesper carried on, “but ever since we left your workshop, I've been wondering if there wasn't a part of you that did it because you thought you owed me after I saved you from that bouncer at the Sweet Shop.”

The revelation had Wylan frowning. “You think I agreed to sex to settle a debt?”

“Well, I just want to make sure I didn't give you the impression you had to repay me in any way. This”, he gestured in the space between them, “has to be totally free and mutual.”

Wylan stepped forward, until the lapels of his coat brushed the buttons on Jesper's. Their height difference meant he had to crane his head back slightly to look at him. “No, Jesper. As grateful as I am that you got me out of there in one piece, I didn't sleep with you because I felt like I owed you. I did it because I wanted to.”

“I'm happy to hear that,” Jesper breathed in relief. His hand came to rest on the side of Wylan’s neck. “Because I’d love to do it again, whenever you feel like it.”

Jesper’s palm was warm and heavy, his rings cold on his skin. Wylan shivered, and it had nothing to do with the rain now pouring down on the two of them. It was that sensation at the pool of his stomach ; that sweet, voracious desire burning its way down to the space between his legs. “I don't think you'll have to wait for very long.”

“That's music to my ears,” Jesper whispered, hungry eyes boring into Wylan's. “It's just a shame we didn't think of making a stop at the apothecary for a vial of oil.”

“Actually, I have a small present for you,” Wylan said, the rosy tint of a sudden blush blooming on his cheekbones. He reached into one of his vest's pockets and pulled out a tiny bottle, which he gave to Jesper.

“What is it?” Jesper asked, looking at the clear content against the light.

Wylan cleared his throat, the heat on his cheeks increasing by a few degrees. “A new concoction of mine: it’s water based, entirely body-safe, and way better than oil for our… purpose.“

“Oh,” Jesper breathed. “This is genius, Wylan. When did you have the time to make this?”

“This morning, while you were still asleep.”

A slow smile crept on Jesper’s face at the implication, admiration changing into something more intense. “Saints… That means you do want this quite badly, don't you?” He pocketed the vial and circled Wylan’s waist, hands pressing onto the small of his back to bring their hips together.

“I want that, yeah, very much so,” Wylan admitted. What was the point in denying? He was dying to feel Jesper inside him again; just like on their first night together. “Are you going to give it to me?”

“Oh, honey. I'd be such an idiot not to.” He threw a quick glance toward the windows of the Dregs' house, like a little boy about to steal cookies from the jar. Then, he leant down to catch Wylan’s lips with his own.

Wylan sighed into the kiss, despite the water dripping from the brim of Jesper’s top hat and trickling down his cheek. It felt so good ; this uncomplicated intimacy. But how long would it last?

***

Nina stood from her chair. “Where have you guys been all night?!” She abandoned her food on the table in order to scold them both. “We were worried sick! Weren't we, Inej?”

“If you say so…” Inej said, non-committal. She was playing with one of her knives, spinning it on the table’s surface.

“Explain yourself immediately,” Nina insisted, shaking a finger at Wylan and Jesper, who just stood there, clothes dripping on the floor of the new Crow Club. The place was still closed at this hour of the afternoon, and apart from the barman cleaning glasses behind the counter and two Dreg bruisers playing checkers in a corner, there was no one else there to witness the scene.

“We were just… you know.. spending time together,” Jesper explained, more taken aback than flustered. Wylan, though, was very much blushing and hoping the floor would swallow him whole.

A cat-like grin spreaded on Nina’s lips. “So you guys finally did it?” As neither of them confirmed or denied, her devilish smile just grew more wicked. “Phew!” she exclaimed, wiping imaginary sweat from her forehead. “'I was about to take the matter into my own hands and push you together into a bed. All that pining was getting hard to watch.”

Jesper crossed his arms and stepped forward, as if to shield Wylan from her innuendos. “Or maybe you could mind your own business, Zenik.”

“But why would I do that, “ she purred, “when it’s so profitable?” She extended a hand toward Inej. “Pay up, dear!”

With a sigh, Inej pulled a ten Kruge bill from her pocket and handed it to Nina.

Jesper clutched at his heart in mock-offense. “Not you too?” he lamented. “Traitor!”

Inej shrugged. “Sorry?”

“It’s all fun and games to speculate and take bets on my sex life, I get it,” Jesper said, growing serious. “But please, nobody tells Kaz that Wylan and I are involved. Not yet. He’ll make a big fuss out of it.”

Nina sat back on her chair. “I can't imagine him making a fuss about anything. “

“Trust me, I can,” Jesper contradicted her.

Inej nodded in silent agreement.

Jesper took his hat off and wiped the rain from it with the back of his hand. “Have you chosen a room here yet?” he asked them, making a head gesture toward the stairwell leading to the living quarters.

Wylan shrugged his coat off. Wet leather got uncomfortable after a while.

“We did,” Inej confirmed. “Nina has the big room on the third floor. I’ve taken the smaller one next to it. We've left you the one on the second floor, across from where Kaz has his office now. “

Jesper's face fell. “Urgh, really?”

“Yep! Ladies get first pick. That's the cardinal rule of gentlemanly etiquette,” Nina reminded him. “We changed the sheets on your new bed, though. So you're welcome.”

***

“It's not bad. Very Zemini-inspired,” Wylan observed when they entered Jesper’s newly appointed bedroom. He had traveled to Weddle with his father when he was eleven. The house interiors in Novyi Zem all had walls in these warm, turmeric tones.

“Yeah, they tried to imitate the style, for sure,” Jesper said, unimpressed.
Of course, the color of the Zemini houses were obtained from ocher clay mixed directly into the wall plaster. This room only had a layer of orange paint applied on regular, white walls; and it had started peeling in places. Zemini imitation in interior design had been all the rage in Kerch…fifteen years ago.

Wylan had expected to find a bigger mess in the bedroom, since the former occupant was part of a band of disreputable criminals. “Who do you think that room belonged to?” he asked, hanging his wet coat on the backrest of a chair, and disposing of a few grease-stained food bags into an empty wood crate he decided was going to serve as a bin.

“Probably one of Haskell's closest lieutenants,” Jesper speculated, putting his own coat to dry next to Wylan’s, “someone Kaz deemed safer to boot out.” He took a pile of weeks old newspapers and dropped them into the crate as well.

A large, oak wood wardrobe took pride of place in a corner of the room. Wylan opened it and discovered at least ten shirts, two jackets, five or six vests, and as many pairs of trousers; all of them seemingly moth free. At the bottom of the wardrobe, two pairs of boots, recently shined, had been abandoned. Whomever those belonged to had left in a hurry. Wylan couldn't blame them. When you’re fleeing the threat of Kaz Brekker, you don't take the time to pack everything.

As Jesper was going through the meager things Inej retrieved from the ruins of the former Crow Club, Wylan kneeled on the floor to inspect the content of a linen chest at the foot of the bed. “Why don't you want Kaz to know we're sleeping together?” he asked suddenly, as the question had been burning his tongue ever since Jesper swore the girls to secrecy. “I'm not angry or anything. Just curious.”

Jesper sighed, turned around and leaned back against the writing desk. “Because he doesn't understand these things… attractions… relationships. He has his own reasons, but still. He can be judgemental at times.”

Jesper cared about Kaz’s opinion; this was another information Wylan filed under ‘things to know about Jesper Fahey’ in his mental cabinet. “What makes you think he doesn't understand?”

“Because if he did, he would already be engaged to the girl he's been pining over for years.”

“Maybe that's not what he wants,” Wylan mused. He folded the pillow cases he had just inspected back into the chest and closed it. Everything in there was clean and perfectly usable. “Maybe he doesn't believe in marriage.”

The rings on Jesper's fingers tapped a rapid rhythm on the edge of the desk as he pondered, worrying his bottom lip between his teeth. “Isn't that what everybody's supposed to want, though? Ultimately at least ? Finding that one person that completes you ; a constant companion; someone with whom you can be a stronger unit than when you're on your own?”

Wylan went back on his feet slowly, lost in thoughts of his own, and walked up to Jesper. “I think people want a lot of different things, sometimes even contradictory ones. “

Jesper sat on top of the desk. When Wylan got close enough, he hooked his fingers into his suspenders under the bottom hem of his vest, and pulled him closer, bracing Wylan’s thighs with his knees. “And what is it that you want, Wylan Hendricks?”

You. I want you. All the time. But, I also want to run away and hide somewhere you'll never find me. This way I'll have no chance of ever disappointing you. “I'm not sure.” he replied, putting his hands on Jesper’s hips, and it still wasn't a lie. Nobody ever cared enough to ask what he wanted out of life, so he hadn't asked himself that question very often. “I'm still trying to figure that out.”

“What I do want, however,” Jesper declared, nuzzling the short stubble on Wylan’s throat, “is to take the hot bath I promised us this morning. Are you still up for it?”

Wylan heaved a deep sigh, his limbs going limp at the very thought. “Sounds like heaven, honestly.”

As Jesper spent a bit more time sorting things around the room, and looking for clean towels they could use, Wylan forged ahead, crossing the hallway to the bathroom to draw them the hot bath Jesper felt they needed and deserved. Except, that plan soon got thwarted by the state of the bathtub’s copper tap. It was misshapen, crooked and crushed, as if someone had vandalized it with blunt force. If Wylan even tried to open the valve, it would squirt water everywhere in the room.

He made his way back to the bedroom, bearer of bad news. “Jes? There's something wrong with the tap. I'm afraid it's unusable.”

Shaking his head with vigor, Jesper removed his waistcoat and tossed it on the bed. “No, I refuse to be cheated out of a bath by faulty plumbing,” he decided, rolling his sleeves up. “Hold on, stay here,” he ordered, and disappeared to the other side of the door.

Wylan took a rag to remove some spider webs around the window frame, but didn't have much time to get to the task, because Jesper was back a few minutes later, drops of water clinging to his tightly coiled hair, the front of his shirt soaked through, clinging to the skin of his chest. “I fixed it,” he announced, with no small amount of pride.

“Wh-how?”

“Hush, darling. Let’s not argue with the good things, shall we?” Jesper grabbed his hand and pulled him out of the room, giggling like a child until they closed and locked the bathroom door behind them. Then, the look in his eyes was not childish anymore. “Would you let me undress you?” he asked, voice nearly muffled by the sound of running water, as he toyed with the buttons of Wylan’s vest.

Wylan responded with a coy smile. “You mean with more than just your eyes? Cause you’ve been doing that all day long.”

A hum of appreciation rumbled at the back of Jesper's throat. “I love it when you sass me.”

Maybe Wylan was starting to get the hang of it - the flirting. It didn't come naturally for him, but to appeal to Jesper, and keep him keen, he was ready to dabble in this unknown art.

Jesper made the vest slip off Wylan's shoulders, but before he put it away, he touched the corks of some of the powders and liquid bottles poking out of the front pockets. “How many of those would kill me?”

“All of them, with the proper dosage or charge,” Wylan confirmed.

“You’re a deadly man,” Jesper commented. From the tone of his voice, and the dark gleam in his eyes, it sounded more like a compliment than anything else.

Wylan's hands brushed Jesper’s waist, and made their tentative descent to the holsters at his belt, giving Jesper ample time to object. “I'll never be as deadly as you can be with those,” Wylan commented. His fingers caressed the pearl handles, appreciating their smooth surface, and then closed around them. Touching the revolvers somehow felt like a most private, sacred thing; forbidden even, but Jesper did not budge and he did not protest when Wylan pulled them out of their holsters slowly. Instead, he just stared down at Wylan’ hands on his weapons, lips slightly parted.

“I don't let just anybody do that, you know.”

“I'm touched you're allowing me, then” Wylan replied. Under Jesper's expert eyes, he uncocked both firearms: pulling the hammer slightly to the rear; locking it in place, and hence, keeping the firing pin from resting on an unfired cartridge case. He put them away next to his own vest.

Jesper threw a look over his shoulder, at the rapidly filling bathtub. “As much as I appreciate the sensuality of the moment, we should accelerate the process before the tub overflows.”
“You're right,” Wylan agreed, attacking the buttons of Jesper's shirt as he did the same with his.

They removed some more pieces of clothing off of each other, and in his hurry to remove his own trousers, as well as boots and socks, Jesper's feet stayed stuck in a tangle of fabric. He would have fallen down onto the bathroom floor had Wylan not caught him by the elbow, laughing a bit at his lover's misfortune.

In the silvery light coming from the thick-glass window pane, Jesper's naked body was just as glorious a sight as it had been the previous night; smooth and lithe ; powerful and agile; supple and firm. He sat in the tub first, turning the water off, then offering a hand to help Wylan step over the edge.

The water was almost too hot, but Wylan let himself be guided into it. Jesper had him sit in front of him, between his legs, so that he could rest his back upon Jesper’s chest if he wanted ; something for which Wylan would certainly not complain.

A familiar sight waited for Wylan in the soap holder. “Oh!” He took the bar and brought it to his nose. The scent was unmistakable. “Where did you find this?”

“A friend had three of these,”Jesper explained, resting his arms on the edge of the tub in a relaxed stance. “They gave one to me.”

“Let me guess : tall, Zemini, flamboyant ; even more than you?”

“Good description. How do you know?”

“Because this is one of mine,” Wylan revealed. “I made that soap.”

“Whoa! Really? A demo man, a musician; and now a soap maker? You never cease to astonish!” Jesper wrapped himself around him and pulled Wylan flush to his chest, creating a tidal wave in the tub as he did. “You are full of surprises; of unexpected twists and turns...and maybe some more secrets too. Who knows?”

Wylan was thinking the very same. It seemed the more he learnt about Jesper, the less he knew.

He started to suspect…. No. He was convinced now that Jesper was a secret grisha; a Durast in hiding. His initial suspicion came the first time they found themselves under the line of fire, during the assault on Bietstraat, and he had seen Jesper in action. He was too good, too quick, too accurate a sharpshooter for it to be a natural talent unaided by the small sciences. Also, when that thug tried to strangle Jesper, during that same assault, the metal bar came out of his hands all crooked after Jesper struggled to get it away from his throat. Then, there was the piano wire at Pekka Rollins’ country house… and now the tap? What Wylan couldn't figure out was why Jesper seemed determined to keep it a secret. Keeping such a gift concealed barely made sense. If Jesper was hiding a talent like this with so much shame, what would he think once he'd discover the genuine flaw Wylan kept in the dark?

Hating that last line of thought, and resolved to create a diversion, Wylan took Jesper's left hand and played with his rings. The garnet one was quite simple, but the green one had a more complex shape, with swirling patterns in white gold and silver, which reminded him of kaelish knot symbols. “You don't remove them to bathe?” he asked.

“No. They always stay on.”

“Do they have any special meaning?”

“They were my mother's,” Jesper said softly, resting his chin over Wylan's shoulder to look at the pieces of jewelry along with him. “ I modif- I mean, I had them enlarged so I could wear them.”

Wylan could guess what he had tried to say. You don’t need the help of a jeweler to enlarge a ring when you’re a Durast. Obviously, he had no intention of Wylan discovering his true nature. And Wylan couldn't help but feel a slight sting. “Your mother, she's not with us anymore as I recall, is she?”

“No.”

“What was her name?”

“Aditi. Aditi Hilli.” Jesper’s perfect Zemini pronunciation made the syllables sing, and elevated the name to the one of an immortal queen.

“It's a beautiful name,” Wylan said, sincere. “How old were you when she passed away?

“Seven.”

With a lump in his throat, Wylan brought Jesper’s hand to his lips and kissed the two knuckles just next to the rings. “I'm sorry to hear that, Jes. I know how it feels. Mine died when I was eight.” He regretted he even brought up the subject. He didn't want to make his lover sad.

“Seems like we have that in common: grief,” Jesper sighed, holding Wylan even tighter. “What was your mama’s name?”

“ Marya Va- Hendricks. Marya Hendricks.” He had nearly let the cursed name slip out of his mouth– the one he had cursed by being a faulty heir. There were aspects of his life he did not want Jesper to know, or see. That made them even, he supposed.

“You're using your mother's maiden name, though. What about your father?”

“He's… not around anymore.”
Wylan would've laughed at his own euphemism, if he could have done so without raising suspicion.

“Lousy father?”

“You can say that.” Another wild euphemism. He knew Jesper would not bat an eyelash. In the Barrel, with rampant crime, prostitution and immorality, good fathers were a scarce commodity.

“Do you have anything like my rings to remember your mama?” Jesper asked, his voice gentle and compassionate.

“No,” Wylan regretted. “It’s like when she died, everything that belonged to her disappeared as well. I remember she had many paintings that she loved. The next day, they were all gone.” He shook his head. “But we don't have to speak about that any further. I want to enjoy what's here and now, with you,” he decided.

“I like that idea,” Jesper concluded, the smile returning to his voice. He was like a weathervane, and Wylan's mood was the wind, pointing him in a more auspicious direction. A porcelain brock lay on the floor nearby and he reached over the edge of the tub to grab it. “I know you're perfectly able to wash your hair by yourself, but can I help you anyway?” he offered.

“Sure.” Wylan moved forward a bit, to leave Jesper enough space to work.

“Tilt your head back for me please?”

Wylan obeyed, finding purchase on the sides of the tub. When Jesper poured water over his hair, he sighed with contentment. This. Just This. It already felt so good. Maybe Jesper was as tender and caring with all of his lovers, but Wylan couldn't help but feel a little special for getting this royal treatment.

“Soap?” Jesper asked, and Wylan passed it over his shoulder.

This time, he wasn't able to keep his mouth from falling open and an earnest moan to escape him when Jesper's long, soapy fingers dug into his wet hair, scratching and massaging : his rings catching slightly on his sensitive scalp.

“I told you I'd find ways to pamper you,” Jesper purred against the wet skin of his shoulder as he kissed him there.

“Fine. You win,” Wylan said with panting breath; eyes closed, head back, fingers gripping the edge of the tub with a bit more strength. “I can also do it for you afterwards.”

“If you want, but I'm not quite done with you yet,” Jesper stated, with a rasp in his voice that sent a hot shiver down Wylan's spine.

Jesper used some excess soap from Wylan's hair to massage his shoulders and the nape of his neck, undoing some painful knots of stress he accumulated there in the last few days of heists and danger. At that point, Wylan had lost control over the noises that passed his lips with every push of Jesper's thumbs on his muscles.

“Beware of the pretty sounds coming out of your mouth, Sunshine,” Jesper warned him. “Or else I'm gonna be forced to scoop you out of this bathtub and carry you to the bedroom while you’re still damp, dripping everywhere, not even giving you the time to grab a towel.”

“I'm sorry,” Wylan apologized, the characteristic heat of a blush overtaking everything from his chest up.

“What on earth for? “ Jesper asked, catching the brock and rinsing Wylan's hair, putting one of his hands over his forehead to shield his eyes from getting soap water into them.

“I… I don't know? For being so needy, I guess?”

Jesper made him spin around in one swift motion, tearing a huff of surprise from Wylan. He grabbed him by the waist, pulling him forward until he was pretty much lying on top of Jesper.

Wylan gasped, because he could now feel the long, hard and throbbing line of Jesper's erection, pressed up against his stomach.

Jesper kissed him deeply, capturing another of Wylan's moans on his tongue, tasting the vibration of it. “If you're needy, that means I'm desperate,” he confided when they parted ever-so-slightly. “I think you severely underestimate the effect you have on me.” His pupils were blown wide – like two dark, freshwater wells. They caught the silver afternoon light coming from the window in a mesmerizing way. Durast magic? Or just Jesper magic? “Let's finish cleaning up. Then, we'll go back to my room immediately,” he decided, his voice thick with desire, “cause if I don't get to have you before this day is over, I'm going to go insane.”

Set up in flames by those words, Wylan dragged Jesper into another searing kiss.

They made quick work of washing themselves, and as much as Wylan enjoyed the texture of Jesper's luscious hair between his fingers, he too was eager to return to the bedroom for a more thorough kind of exploration.

They got out of the tub, and Wylan was nearly done drying himself up with a towel, when Jesper decided to shake the water out of his hair like a puppy coming out of a pond.

“Hey!,” Wylan yelped in protest, half-outraged, half-laughing, which prompted Jesper to do it again, with renewed vigor. “Stop, you scoundrel! I was already dry!”

“Oh sorry,” Jesper smirked, not the least bit sorry. He reached out and wiped some droplets from Wylan's right brow with his thumb, before taking a towel and wrapping it around his hips. He went to the door and pulled it ajar, peeking into the corridor. Afterall, they were on the same floor as Kaz's office, and although Wylan didn't have the same misgivings as Jesper about Kaz learning of their affair, he still didn't want the boss to see them both sneaking around, half-naked and giggly.

“The coast is clear,” Jesper announced, and they hurried across the hallway, towel clad, carrying their clothes and respective weapons into the bedroom.

The clothes soon got tossed in a corner and forgotten, at least in Jesper's case. Wylan tried to fold his and leave them on the nightstand, but he didn't get the time, and was soon tossed onto the bed by his eager lover.

Jesper climbed on the bed and knelt beside him. His skin was still damp and dewy from the bath, warm and supple, and his muscles relaxed. Three or four drops of water were traveling down the dark line of his clavicle. Wylan wished he had a pen and paper to sketch the athletic shape of his shoulder and those water drops adorning it like pearls. At the same time, he wanted to lick them off his skin.

Wylan reached out to stroke Jesper's lower stomach, just above the edge of the towel. His breath caught in his throat. He might just be the most thoroughly gorgeous man Wylan had ever seen. It was surreal that someone like Jesper would want him, of all people. He had this urge to pinch himself again. If this was a dream, Wylan just hoped he would die in it.

Bringing his hands to Wylan's stomach as well, Jesper undid the twist of towel that protected his modesty and spreaded the piece of cloth to expose him.

Wylan shifted onto his stomach, offering his back to Jesper's attention. He heard the telltale rustling of Jesper getting rid of his own towel. Soon he was upon Wylan, gracing his tailbone with an open-mouthed kiss, then another one a little higher, then another one, and trailing more and more kisses up his spine, taking his time so Wylan could feel and enjoy each one. Wylan shuddered, buried his face into the pillow, muffling needy whimpers and gripping it with all his might. He couldn't help the unconscious roll of his hips onto the mattress as his body strived for any sort of friction and relief.

Having reached the top of his spine, Jesper kissed his nape, and then sucked a tender bruise at the junction between his neck and shoulder as he draped his naked form over Wylan’s.

Wylan was already shaky, almost feverish: sick with desire, and the hot, firm weight of Jesper’s cock against his backside did not help in the slightest. Almost of their own volition, his hips lifted off the mattress, pushing into Jesper's erection, demanding for needs to be met and instincts satiated.

Jesper gathered him into his arms and made them roll together onto their side, his chest still pressed to Wylan’s back. His fingers roamed his abdomen, teasing slightly, making their way down in a torturous manner.

When one of Jesper's hands finally reached between his thighs and gave Wylan the firm touch he had been dying for, he threw his head back and it came nestling between Jesper’s own head and the pillow. This gave Jesper better access to kiss his neck, to mark it with gentle love bites, and trail nips along the column of his throat.

His own breathing becoming more erratic with every second that passed, Jesper confessed: “I'd love to take you right now, just like this.“

“You can,” Wylan assured him. Emboldened, he pulled himself up the mattress and hitched his leg backwards, so his thigh came resting into the curve of Jesper's waist. He angled his hips, showing Jesper that this was very much a possibility.

“Look at you,” Jesper commented, voice hoarse from lust. “Giving yourself to me…”

Of course Wylan ached for this with every last cell of his being, because this might be the last time he'd sleep with Jesper. Their story had been a ticking time bomb from the very first time their eyes met across the gambling hall of Club Cumulus.

“I … I don't need preparation. I just need you,” Wylan begged when he heard Jesper open the cork on the vial he had gifted him earlier.

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“I don't want to hurt you.”

“You won't.”

“You'll tell me if I do?”

“I promise, just… please…”

“I’ll begin slowly,” Jesper whispered, coating himself up with the content of the bottle. “You look so lovely. I’d be fucking stupid not to take good care of you.”

Wylan braced himself for the overwhelming sensation he knew was coming. He wanted it badly, and yet felt unprepared to handle it. In any case, how can you truly be prepared for the man of your dreams entering you?

When Jesper’s damp fingers found purchase around his hip bone, keeping him steady, Wylan closed his eyes and relaxed, trusting Jesper implicitly; doing his best to welcome rather than fight the exquisite intrusion. His heart was hammering so hard in his chest he had to gasp for air, but, at last, Jesper was fully sheathed inside him.

“Talk to me, love,” Jesper ordered, keeping himself still; arousal and worry vying for dominance in his deep voice. “How do you feel?”

“So good. So-so full.” Wylan took a sharp inhale. “Wh-what about you?”

Jesper was showing a huge amount of restraint, but it was fraying by the second. “Saints…it-it feels incredible. Like velvet and silk.” His fingers gripped his hip tighter, and Wylan whined. “You're being such a good boy for me. So damn pretty.” His breath was teasing the hair at the back of Wylan’ neck, spreading gooseflesh all over his shoulders. “I'm going to fuck you now, okay?” Jesper stated. It was more of an inevitability at this point than a true question,

“Ye-yes. Please,” Wylan begged once more.

And this time, Jesper let go of any control he still kept on himself up to this point. He took all the pleasure he could from Wylan’ body, every last drop of it, and this was exactly what Wylan had been hoping for. Except, submitting to Jesper's desires felt even better than what he had imagined. Wylan’s conscious thoughts got stuck somewhere between the sharp delight of being fucked with such abandon, and the knowledge of the sounds coming from his mouth, which he should maybe try to contain, but simply couldn't.

The tension and heat; it was mounting at high speed, building in such a way that Wylan knew he was not going to last long. “Touch me, Jes…”

But Jesper did not grant him his wish, at least not right away. He slowed the pace instead, turning it languid and lazy, making Wylan whimper in frustration. “What’s the magic word?” Jesper demanded, stretching his neck to bite Wylan’s earlobe. “I only reward pretty boys when they’re polite and proper.“ His tongue traced the sensitive earshell, making Wylan shudder, and quiver around him.

“Please, Jesper! Please!” Wylan surrendered. He wanted to be good for Jesper… so good.

“That’s much better,” Jesper cooed, and his left hand abandoned his anchor point on Wylan’s hip to wrap around his arousal instead. The dual stimulation was almost unbearable, and it tore a series of cries from Wylan, some of which might have been audible all the way to the bar downstairs if Jesper hadn't put his free hand over his mouth to muffle them. “Shh shh shh,” Jesper soothed, while keeping up with his deep and powerful thrusts into Wylan’s willing body.

The gesture and shushing only participated in making pleasure explode inside Wylan’s stomach and driving him over the edge. Jesper reached his peak as well, riding through his climax with his forehead pressed between Wylan’s shoulder blades.

Wylan blacked out for a second… or a minute? Hard to tell. When he came to, Jesper was still holding him close, arms wrapped around his chest, his whole body heaving as he tried to get a grip back on himself. Wylan sunk his teeth into the pillow, tears of overstimulation running down his face and wetting the pillowcase as Jesper pulled out, painfully gentle. Wylan regretted nothing.

Using their discarded towels from earlier, Jesper cleaned them both, something for which Wylan was grateful, since he felt too boneless to do it for himself.

Jesper joined him in the bed soon after and they spent the next few minutes exchanging breathless kisses as Jesper brushed away the curls sticking to Wylan's forehead and stroked his hair. “Trust me, I don't say that lightly, but this was, hands down, the best sex I've ever had.”

“I bet you say that to all your lovers,” Wylan countered, half-teasing, half-serious.

“I assure you I don’t.”

“Was it because of this?” Wylan asked, pointing at the vial Jesper left on the nightstand.

Jesper made a broad gesture encompassing both Wylan and his creation. “I think it was the whole package, honestly. “

Wylan stretched his back. He was a bit sore, in the best of ways. “ To be perfectly candid, I think it's the best I've ever had as well,” he admitted, “not that I've had that many similar experiences to compare it to.”

“Oh? What do you mean?,” Jesper asked, intrigued, propping himself up on one elbow, the fingers on his other hand tracing idle patterns over Wylan's ribcage.

“I’m far from being a virgin, mind you, but the first time you and I slept together was still the first time someone made love to me.” Wylan blushed. Maybe he shouldn't have used that expression. “By that I mean… fucked me,” he corrected.

The hand on his ribcage stilled. “Saints, Wy!” Jesped exclaimed.” And you didn't think to tell me?”

Wylan gave a one-shoulder shrug. “No. I didn't see how it would be relevant.”

Apparently, Jesper did not agree. “Of course it was relevant! I would have been more gentle with you, more careful!”

“You were gentle enough, and I did not need careful.”

With a throaty laugh, Jesper pinned Wylan’s wrists above his head and climbed on top of him. “Clearly not, you minx.” Having Wylan at his mercy, he took that as an invitation to pepper a hundred kisses on his neck and jawline. “How did I get so lucky, huh?”

Wylan did not answer. Better leave Jesper to his illusions for now. He would let himself be pampered and appreciated while it lasted.

Another mystery about Jesper was his capacity to be still bursting with energy even after a romp like this. If anything, it seemed to have energized him even more, and as much as Wylan admired his tiredlessness, he himself was exhausted. He failed to stifle a yawn.

Jesper released his hands and rolled off him. “Are you tired?” he asked softly.

Wylan nodded, burying his face into the closest pillow to escape the daylight.

Jesper pulled one of the blankets Nina or Inej had left at the foot of the bed to cover Wylan with it. He rubbed the small of his back and whispered in his ear “You can nap for a bit, then. You've more than earned it.”

Already drifting into sleep, Wylan barely registered Jesper collecting his clothes around the room, getting dressed, or the click of the bedroom door when he left.

Chapter Text

Jesper had sensitive fingers – they burned easily, and money was the primary hazard. He could never keep it for long. Money had one purpose; to be spent, or gambled away– not to stay idle in his pocket. He never understood Kerch people, who wanted to hoard it into safes and bank accounts - sit on it like old dragons. But then again, he wasn't Kerch. He was half-Zemini, and Zemini believed nothing was as important as today – nothing more valuable than the present.

Jesper intended on honoring his hedonistic ancestors by spending, before tomorrow morning, every last Kruge from the stack Kaz gave him before he left the Dreg’s house. That represented his regular cut as a gang member, plus a bonus for his role in bringing Rollins down. He had the bills for twenty minutes now, and the three hundred kruge already burned a hole through his pocket. That was a good thing he had several stops to make, and many things to buy. It would make his wallet a lot lighter.

First, he retrieved his new set of clothes at the tailor shop, and then, made a detour by one of the high-end hat makers by the Geldcanal, in the hope to start rebuilding his collection.

He had just selected a top hat in splendid black hare felt, and was toying with the idea of treating himself to one made out of beaver and otter, when he overheard a conversation between two young merchers waiting in line to pay for their bowler hats.

“They still haven't found the Van Eck kid,” one said to the other. “It's been five months since his father had last heard of him.”

“There's a rumor going on that he was a dimwit,” the other replied. “That’s why the Councilman never brought him to any public function. Maybe he just got lost and was mugged and killed in the Barrel by one of their gangs of brainless thugs.”

“Or maybe, he ran away because he was tired of your boring, stuffy lifestyle,” Jesper couldn't help but interject. He didn't care much about the fate of one vanished heir, but he wanted to rile those two up ; bring them down a peg or two.

The merchers turned around to assess him, with clear disgust in their eyes. “We weren't talking to you, shitstain,” one of them spat.

Casually, Jesper rolled his right sleeve up, exposing the tattoo on his forearm; the crow and cup that identified him as a member of one of the most dreaded gangs of “brainless thugs” in Ketterdam. He put his hands on his hips, pulling his leather coat back as he did, revealing the hardware on his belt. “You were saying?”

The men's faces blanched and they swallowed in sync.

“I'd be careful if I were you,” Jesper went on, having more fun with it than he probably should. “Because I think you just figured out what we do to innocent little merchlings like you in the Barrel. Who knows? You could end up like that councilman’s kid.”

They had the wisdom to turn away and remain silent until the store clerk called them to the counter.

In the end, Jesper decided he deserved not one, but two pure beaver hats, in addition to the hare one he had already chosen. On his way back across the Lid, he stopped by the bakery on koekjestraat, and came out of there laden like a pack mule, now holding six different bags.

He had to go back to the Dregs’ house now. He would hate for Wylan to wake up and stay alone in that foreign bedroom for too long. What if he got bored; or thought Jesper had abandoned him there? He would probably gather his stuff and go back to his workshop. But that wasn't what Jesper was planning - he still had a lot in store for Wylan tonight.

His ideal scenario would be to come back and find Wylan still asleep in the bed – all lazy and warm, hair tousled, limbs relaxed. Maybe, he would let him sleep some more…. or be selfish and kiss him awake. Perhaps, Jesper could even undress and join him in the bed. So many possibilities – and each one of them released a swarm of butterflies in his stomach – the same butterflies Wylan said made silk.

The bells on Sankt Piotr’s church struck seven when Jesper strode past the opened door of the Lucky Nine Casino. The sound of laughter, the distinct rolling of a dice on a hard surface, and the telltale clicks of the Makker's wheel escaped out from the opened door, and onto the street, calling Jesper like a siren’s song. He froze on the sidewalk, the hair on his arms standing from the call of adrenaline. He still had eighty kruge in his pocket ; enough to make one or two good wagers. If he was lucky enough, he could turn 80 kruge into 160. That would give him the means to spoil Wylan some more, should he wish to do so. He could even buy Inej a new set of knives. Maybe she'd even call one Sankt Jesper. He put three of the bags down on the cobblestones and flexed his sore fingers. How good and soothing would it feel to have a dice roll out of them? Very good indeed.

But what about Wylan? What if he woke up and waited? And waited some more?

A quick round of dice took fifteen minutes; twenty minutes at the most. It wouldn't hurt anybody.

“No! Not tonight,” Jesper chastised himself, shaking his head to chase the thought. He shouldered the shopping bags and headed up the street, eager to put as much distance as he could between him and the temptation.

***

The night had fallen already and the bedroom was shrouded in darkness when Jesper tiptoed in. He put his bags down on the floor, as quietly as he could manage. Much to his relief, the sound of deep, regular breathing told him Wylan was still there, and Jesper smiled to himself as he struck a match to light the oil lamp on the nightstand. He was the one who had made that pretty boy so exhausted by showing him a good, if not exceptional time. The idea made his chest swell with pride.

When Jesper walked around the bed to light a second lamp, Wylan began to stir. He sat up, the blanket falling in his lap and revealing his pale chest in the flickering lamp light. He rubbed his eyes, groggy and a little lost.

“Good morning, handsome,” Jesper told him.

Wylan glanced at the window. “Is it really morning?”

“Of course not,” Jesper replied with a chortle. “I'm messing with you. You did sleep for more than three hours, though.”

Wylan ran both hands through his hair, which only managed to make it messier. “You went out?” he asked, noticing the bags Jesper had left on the floor.

“Yep. I picked up my new clothes from Dhòmhnaill’s and made a few more stops,” Jesper explained, placing the bags from the tailor shop and the hat maker at the foot of the bed to put their contents away.

Not quite back into the land of the living yet, Wylan yawned and stayed quiet for a while. He watched, eyes half lidded, as Jesper piled his new shirt, waistcoat, jacket and kilt on the back of a chair. But then, Jesper pulled something out of the same bag that alarmed Wylan.

“What’s this?”

“What's what?” Jesper asked with an angelic smile - innocence incarnated.

“The thing you have in your hand!” Wylan insisted.

“Oh this? It’s a silk neckerchief,” he explained, showing Wylan the blue, grey and green fabric, and the silver pin that went with it

Of course, Wylan recognized the garment they had been admiring together at the tailor shop earlier. “I thought I told you not to buy it!” he protested.

“Oh! It's not for you! It's for me, actually,” Jesper corrected. “It happens to be my color too, you see?” He made a show of placing it against his throat, so Wylan could admire the effect. “I'll put it right here,” he then said, opening the drawer of the vanity by the window. “And if you ever wish to borrow it… well, you certainly are welcome to.”

Stubborn, Wylan crossed his arms and pinched his lips. “I won't.”

“Suit yourself… although it might come in handy if you want to conceal that lovely necklace of bruises,” Jesper argued making a vague gesture toward Wylan's neck.

“My what?!” Wylan jumped out of bed, stark naked, and rushing to the vanity to take a look in the mirror. “Ghezen above! Jesper!” he lamented, when he took in his own image. A collection of red, blue and violet marks adorned the flesh of his neck, and it was written Jesper all over it.

The culprit chuckled. “Nina is going to have a field day with those. You'll never hear the end of it.” He should feel bad about it, perhaps, but failed to. “Just so you know, I take full responsibility, although, in my defense, the skin of your neck is very sensitive, and also very tempting.

“This isn't a good defense at all,” Wylan hissed, his fingers grazing an especially dark, tender spot on his throat. “What about Kaz? What if he sees this, huh?”

Jesper shrugged. “He'll assume you got into a fight.”

“Using my neck?”

“Exactly. Just like a giraffe,” Jesper laughed.

Wylan turned to him, eyes narrowed. “You find that very funny, don't you?”

Taking pity on the naked, mortified young man standing by his vanity, Jesper tossed his hat away, walked up to him and wrapped him in his arms. “I find that a little bit funny,” he admitted, leaning down to soothe some of the worst love bites with careful kisses. “But don't tell me you never had lovers marking you like this before?”

“Not to that extent,” Wylan pouted, although he was relaxing into the embrace already.

“They’re all idiots, then,” Jesper decided. Why buy your lover jewelry when you can embellish their beautiful neck with the work of your own teeth? “Although the neckerchief’s mine, as I clearly stated, I did buy something for you. Well, for the two of us,” Jesper said, letting go of Wylan in order to unpack the baked goods.

Wylan grabbed his own shirt and put it on. He sat on the bed, legs crossed. “What’s all this?” he asked, eyeing the four pastry boxes Jesper placed on the blanket in front of him.

“Oliebollen donuts, butter cakes, tompoes,” Jesper enumerated, as he opened the lid on each box. ”Oh! And also some chocolate-coated cream-filled bossche bols.”

Wylan's eyes were getting rounder and rounder with every new treat that appeared in front of him. “This is all dessert, Jesper,” he pointed out.

“Yes! Decadent, isn't it?” Jesper climbed on the bed and sat next to Wylan. “And we’re going to eat all of these right here, in bed.”

Wylan lifted an eyebrow, “Are you trying to get me fat?”

“You've got a long way to go, Sunshine,” Jesper observed, although he did have some ulterior motives. Wylan’s stomach wasn't just flat - it was hollow. Jesper could easily count and trace each one of his ribs. His hips were jutting out like mountain peaks. “Don't mistake me, I adore your body as it is; can't get enough of it,” Jesper added in all honesty, “but it might be healthier for you, perhaps, if you had at least a tiny bit of padding?” He hoped Wylan wouldn't take it the wrong way. This concern came from good intentions.

“It’s not that I don't want to eat,” Wylan said softly, scanning the array of goods before him as if he still wondered whether they were real. “It’s just that money has been a bit sparse lately.” He picked a donut between careful fingers and took a small bite into it.

The entrancing smell of chocolate was making Jesper’ mouth water, and without further ado, he popped two bossche bols in his mouth. “I understand. But It won't be a problem from now on,” he said around his mouthful. “For as long as you remain a Crow, Kaz will make sure you always have enough to eat.”

Wylan scoffed. “From the sheer kindness of his heart, I'm sure.”

“He invested in your skills by providing a workshop for you, hasn't he?” Jesper reminded him. “Kaz protects his investments. And he'll hate me for saying that, but there's also a heart somewhere underneath that icy exterior.” Speaking of icing, there was a bit of powdered sugar clinging at the corner of Wylan’s lips. Without thinking, Jesper reached out to wipe it with his thumb.

Caught off guard by the spontaneous gesture, Wylan flinched. Jesper winked, and licked the sugar off his thumb. Wylan’s face got even redder than the jam in the tompoes.

As far as Jesper could tell, sex didn't faze Wylan, or flustered him that much. He knew what he wanted and how to get it. It was the other forms of intimacy or affection that startled him the most; as if he had no idea how to take them – how to react or respond to any of it. It spoke of an existence likely devoid of any real closeness. The thought made Jesper sad and concerned.

By the time Wylan finished nibbling on his second donut, Jesper managed to make a generous slice of butter cake disappear, reduce a tompoes to crumbs, and get through four more bossche bols. “Come on! Get in there,” Jesper encouraged him. “You're eating like we're attending high tea with the Queen of Ravka.”

Wylan glared at him. “I just have good manners. It's you who eats like an ogre.”

Feeling playful, Jesper shifted on his hands and knees. “Oh, but I am an ogre! And do you know what ogres do?”

“I don't know, but it sounds terrifying,” Wylan said, with a sigh and a roll of his eyes, although a hint of amusement tugged at the corner of his lips.

“They come at night, when everyone’s asleep; they spot the prettiest boy in the village, and they EAT HIM WHOLE,” Jesper shouted, pouncing forward and tackling Wylan into the pillows.

“Get off me, you oaf!” Wylan protested, laughing and trying to push Jesper away. “You're putting crumbs everywhere!”

In response, Jesper turned into the worst of dead weights, and made good use of his long limbs, effectively trapping Wylan’s smaller, half-naked frame underneath him.

Wylan had no choice but to admit defeat and surrender.
He held Jesper’s face between his hands for a breathless few seconds before he said: “You're an idiot, Jesper Fahey.”

“But you somehow appreciate that about me.”

“Strangely enough, I do like that about you,” Wylan admitted.

“But do you like like me?”

“I possibly like like you, yes.”

Why was Jesper’s heart racing? They were not wrestling anymore. Was he getting out of shape? Must be all that sugar.

He stole a peck from Wylan’s equally sugar-coated lips before he released him. He left the bed, discarded some of the empty bags and boxes, and dusted the crumbs from the bedsheets, already itching to move to the next thing. “It's eight bells,” he announced. “The night's still young; in infancy even. Do you want to go out and celebrate?”

“Sure, Wylan agreed with a smile, taking the last donut before Jesper put the box away. “And what would we be celebrating?”

“My newfound freedom? Pekka Rollins being locked away? The incredible sex we had earlier? Do we really need a reason?”

“I suppose not. Where do you want to go? The céilí Dhòmhnaill invited us to?”

“We could,” Jesper pondered. He looked at himself in the mirror and removed his brown tie with the intention to replace it with his brand new, violet one. “But before we go there, I made a promise to a good friend a few days ago, and I intend to honor it.” He gave Wylan a bright grin over his shoulder. “I hope you like burlesque theater.”

***

Clubs in Ketterdam tended to be quite on-the-nose when it came to interior decoration. Even Kaz had leaned heavily into that when he chose to have the old Crow Club painted in charcoal black, to furnish it with black leather chairs, and drape the windows in black curtains. The Blue Paradise obeyed the same general principle. Upon entering the main entertainment hall, guests were greeted by the sight of pale blue walls, framed in white paneling with swirling motifs meant to evoke clouds. The shiny floor tiles alternated from royal blue to indigo. Atop white stucco columns, angels statues supported the high ceiling. These angels, with their long-lashes, pouty lips and youthful, symmetrical features, weren't that dissimilar to the man holding Jesper’s arm as they crossed through the venue toward the stage.

“I feel like I've just walked into a wedding cake,” Wylan deadpanned.

Jesper bursted out laughing.
“Scratch that,” he thought. Wylan wasn't an angel. He was a mischievous, woodland sprite, and Jesper liked this idea even better.

It was still early. The show wouldn't begin for another half-hour, and since there were representations almost every day, most spectators would show up at the last minute. There were still plenty of seats available. That allowed them to secure a table right by the stage.

“Is this your first time coming here?” Jesper asked Wylan, pulling a chair for him in a gesture of gallantry.

“Yes,” Wylan said, accepting the offer. “Van Leeuwen offered me to make some extra money working here as a busboy once a week, but I had the job at the tannery already, so I turned it down.”

One distinctive characteristic of the Blue Paradise was that the stage had been built lower than normal to give an impression of closeness between the audience and the performers; an ingenious strategy on Van Leeuwen's part, which helped the Blue Paradise secure a reputation as one of the top show halls in the city. With Poppy as the headline act, it was now a sure recipe for success.

On the topic of ingenious strategies, Jesper could only be proud of his own. Wylan looked dashing with the silk neckerchief Jesper had shamelessly manipulated him into wearing. Wylan also agreed to swap his usual demo man's multi-pocket vest for a more distinguished, tawny waistcoat that Jesper found in the wardrobe of his new room. It rendered Wylan’s slender figure even more graceful.

Tonight, a sweet and warm sort of happiness coursed through Jesper’s veins like syrup.

He removed his top hat, put it down on the table and tamed his hair. “Do you like cocktails?” he asked.

“I do,” Wylan replied, still distracted by the tacky extravagance of the room around them. All of the tables had a blue satin tablecloth, which matched the uniforms worn by the staff, probably cut from the same, exact fabric.

“They have an extensive choice of rather creative ones,” Jesper commented, grabbing a menu from the table and handing it to Wylan. “Here's the list. Tell me which one you want and I'll fetch it for you at the bar.”

At first, Wylan froze, sudden panic flickering in his eyes for an instant, as if the piece of printed cardboard was a stick of dynamite. Jesper understood ; choosing from that many options could be daunting.

“Uh hm. A-Actually,” Wylan stammered, “I think I should bring our coats to the cloak room.”

Jesper stopped him before he could stand from his chair. “Nonsense. I'm the one who invited you. Let me do that.” He helped Wylan shrug his coat off and draped it over his arm, along with his own. “I'll be right back. You can take your time with the menu. And if you want to order food as well, feel free.” Wylan looked almost relieved when he walked away from the table, but Jesper chose to brush it off as Wylan being shy, and nervous about the new setting.

The young lady working the cloak room handed Jesper two tin tokens with embossed hanger numbers. On his way back to the venue, Jesper threw the token in the air and caught them, wondering if he'd be able to shoot them before they'd touch the ground. Of course he would! His personal record was four coins. But it had been a while, and he needed to practice if he wanted to still be able to do that neat little trick again.

“Jes! You came!” a familiar voice hailed him the second he set foot inside the venue again.

“Of course I came! I made you a promise didn't I?” He greeted Poppy with a quick hug and a kiss on both cheeks. “I even brought a date!”

Poppy chuckled, smoothing the silver, strapless gown Jesper had ruffled with his spontaneous hug. “Really? A proper date? Or just someone you're hoping to bag before the night is over?”

“Oh come on, Pyp! I'm not that crass,” Jesper protested, stung to the quick. “It is a proper date, I swear.”

Poppy's hawk eyes scanned the room. “So, who's the lucky person?” The place was beginning to be significantly more crowded. ”No!” they cut him off before he could reply. “Please, let me guess, for old time's sake.”

Jesper crossed his arms. “We're still playing that game?” he said with a huff that betrayed more fondness than true annoyance.

“I love that game,” Poppy stated, scanning the room again, with renewed attention. “Hm.. Let me see… it’s the woman in the green dress; the one with the fur collar.” They pointed at a young woman leaning on the bar.

“Nope! She's clearly with that guy with the monocle. You're not as good as you used to be,” Jesper teased.

“As per the rules, I still have two chances,” Poppy reminded him, not discouraged in the slightest. “Is it them, over there, in the black trench coat?”

“Not bad, but wrong,” Jesper replied. He made a point of looking anywhere except in Wylan's specific direction, as not to give it away. “You only have one chance left.”

“Oh! I know!” Poppy rejoiced. “It's that cutie sitting at the table by the center of the stage, with the mop of curls, the blue shirt and the brown waistcoat,” they said, pointing at Wylan.

Jesper sighed. “Am I that predictable?”

“Usually, yes, but in your defense, you've left your top hat on the table, and also, he was staring this way a second ago. I think he's looking for you.”

As Wylan turned around to look in their direction again, Jesper waved at him and motioned to invite him to join them.

“So, are you going to introduce me?” Poppy asked, smoothing their gown once more.

“Of course I will, you silly goose,” Jesper reassured his friend.

As soon as Wylan was within arm-length, Jesper put a hand on the small of his back. “I believe you two already met, but I'll make the introduction anyway. Poppy, this is Wylan. Wy, this is my friend Poppy Njoroge, the star of tonight's show.”

“Pleasure to meet you, Wylan,” Poppy said, offering their hand to shake. “Your face seems familiar indeed… Oh.. wait! You're that little soap maker from Zelverstraat, aren't you?

“Not that little, but yes, I am, amongst other things,” Wylan replied, accepting the handshake.

“Wylan also has some rather explosive talents that caught Kaz's interest,” Jesper supplied, “if you know what I mean.”

Poppy tilted their head to the side, scrutinizing Wylan in their intense manner with which they always did everything. “Yeah. Not so little, then.”

“It's nice to officially make your acquaintance, Poppy,” Wylan said, polite, but a little stiff. “I'm looking forward to seeing your performance tonight. I know nothing about burlesque theater, but Jesper has been telling me a lot of good things about your previous shows on our way here.”

“I don’t doubt it. Jes can be very… effusive,” Poppy remarked with a laugh.

“That's one word for it,” Wylan replied.

Jesper huffed. “I'm still here, you know?”

Wylan turned toward him. “And while you're here, do you want something to drink?”

“Sure! Just a whisky on the rocks, please? You’re a saint.”

“Poppy?” Wylan offered.

They shook their head with a smile. “That's very kind of you to offer but I'm good. Thank you.”

“I’ll be right back,” Wylan announced.

“So? What do you think?” Jesper asked his friend once Wylan was out of earshot, his gaze following his lover's progression as he slalomed between the tables toward the bar.

“Oh, Mpenzi,” Poppy sighed. “You're in so much trouble.”

Jesper snapped his head around. “Why? What do you mean?”

“I know you. You can't resist a stray kitten with teeth and claws. You'll be head over heels before the month is over.”

“We're on the 25th!” Jesper protested, after a quick calculation. “The month ends in six days, Pyp!”

“I said what I said!”
Next to the side entrance to the stage, an important-looking man in a blue suit, probably the show manager, was gesturing for Poppy to follow him.
“I gotta go. They're waiting for me backstage.”

“Okay,” Jesper replied, kissing Poppy's powdered cheek one last time and squeezing their shoulder. “Break a leg.”

With Poppy gone, Jesper went back to the table and waited for Wylan there, his friend’s prediction still playing on a loop inside his brain.

“Thank you, gorgeous,” he said with a smile when Wylan put a glass of whisky in front of him and sat. Jesper eyed the green liquid in Wylan's own thumbler. “Absinthe, huh? Be careful. This is stronger than beer.”

“I'm not a child, Jes,” Wylan snorted before taking a sip. To his credit, he barely even winced.

“I'm just saying!” There wasn't much to Wylan to begin with, as far as body mass went. He'd not be a great candidate to hold alcohol well. “I'm sure you're adorable when you're tipsy, though,” he teased, with a wiggle of his eyebrows.

“Wouldn't you like to find out,” Wylan quipped back, the fingers of his right hand still wrapped around his glass. He had nice, pianist hands, Jesper observed. Or maybe, those were flautist hands? He hadn't met enough flautists to know. In any case, he reckoned they'd look even better with rings. They deserved to have attention drawn to them.

Jesper tapped his own rings to the side of his glass as a surrogate for clapping when the lights dimmed and the curtain raised.

As the show began, and music filled the hall, he had this sudden need to lay his hand on Wylan's thigh under the tablecloth, and leave it there. But he had also noticed how flustered those casual gestures made him. He didn't want to distract Wylan from enjoying the show, so he compromised by draping his arm over the back of his chair instead.

Was Poppy right? Was he falling for Wylan already? That hard? That fast?

Sure, he liked Wylan's company, enjoyed their conversations, and was impressed with his intellect.

Of course, the sex was amazing, and Wylan had this hunger Jesper ached to satisfy. And even though they hadn't done anything that extravagant between the sheets so far, there was just this intense connection and understanding between them ; between their bodies.

Sure, they also had life experiences in common, like the loss of their respective mother figures.

And indeed, Wylan was so pretty Jesper couldn't tear his eyes off him half the time.
But did that mean he was in love? They barely knew each other. How much do you have to know someone in order to determine whether you're in love with them?

Poppy didn't use the word “love”, Jesper reminded himself. They said “head over heels”. That meant “very smitten”, and Jesper could make peace with that. He had been smitten with Wylan from their very first interaction at Club Cumulus. This was nothing new. Jesper was a lover and a connoisseur of human beauty. He was easily seduced and struck by it. Usually, though, at the first hint of catching feelings, Jesper would step back, spend some days away from the target of his infatuation, and after a while, he’d be able to put his foolish thoughts into perspective. But the thing was that he had no wish to step back from Wylan. If anything, he wanted to bring him even closer. And that was the scary part. Cause feelings ; they bind, and they keep you in place, and Jesper was too restless to be confined and restricted.

The curtain fell. The audience clapped, and Jesper clapped along, joining in the standing ovation, although he realized he would have to come back and see the show again, cause if Poppy decided to quiz him on anything specific, he'd fail that test for sure.

In the end, he had not seen much of what happened on stage. He had watched most of it through Wylan - had witnessed the play of lights through the changing glow on the pale skin of his face, and in the shifting shadows of his eyelashes. He had enjoyed the funny bits through the way Wylan laughed. He had felt the thrill of the acrobatics performed by the dancers in the way his eyes lit up and his lips parted in awe.

“That was… that was something else!” Wylan commented, once the lights were turned back on and people started to flock toward the exit. “Your friend Poppy has such an expansive voice range. Their shift from chest to head vocals was flawless each and every time.”

“I'm glad you've enjoyed yourself,” Jesper said with a sincere smile.

“I did! Very much so! The dancers were incredible, weren't they?”

Jesper nodded. The enthusiastic sparkle of Wylan's eyes had the same color as whisky. The glow on his cheeks was definitely the work of the absinthe, though.

“And the music, Jes! It's so novel; so different from anything I've ever heard before! I have to see the music sheets for this. They must be utterly fascinating.”

“I can always ask Poppy if they have access to copies,” Jesper offered, putting his hat back on and standing from his chair.

“You'd do that for me?” Wylan asked, as if he didn't dare believing it.

“Of course I would.”

Outside the venue, they got in the waiting line to retrieve their coats. “Should we go see Poppy and congratulate them?” Jesper offered.

“We could,” Wylan hesitated, biting his lip. “I don't think they like me very much, though.”

“What makes you say that?”

“They seemed…wary?”

Jesper waved in dismissal. “They're just protective of me, that's all.”

Wylan’s shoulder relaxed an inch, and he gave Jesper a little smirk. “Can't blame them. I feel like you have a tendency to be reckless.”

“Don’t worry. I know Poppy,” Jesper tried to reassure him further. “They’ll warm up to you in no time.” He took Wylan’s chin and indulged himself in a bit of gushing. “I mean, who wouldn't ?” He pulled Wylan closer to seal their lips in a chaste kiss. Wylan sighed in it with content. And as chaste as it could be, one kiss turned into two, then three, until the person waiting behind them cleared their throat. The queue had moved in the meantime and it was their turn to go to the counter.

“I'm sure Poppy is being hounded by fans right now anyways,” Jesper told Wylan, as he fished the tokens in the depths of his trousers’ pocket. “We’ll come back another time, when they’re less busy. I have my own secret entrance.”

“Oh,” Wylan breathed, and he remained silent until the employee came back with their belongings. “Were you and Poppy ever… intimate? “ Wylan asked, as Jesper helped him put his coat on, like the gentleman he was.

“For a time,” Jesper said, not wishing to hide this particular fact. “Didn't last, though. We're better off as friends now.”

“ I see,” Wylan replied. He accepted Jesper’s silent offer and linked his arm with his as they walked out of the Blue Paradise.

Jesper noticed there was a new tension in his lover’s stance, however, and a small crease between Wylan’s eyebrows. Had he said something wrong? Should he have lied? If he had indeed lied, and that Wylan found out later, from someone else, surely it would have been worse, wouldn't it?

After a few minutes of walking, and taking as much fresh air as Ketterdam was able to provide, the tension started to dissipate.

Just enjoying an evening stroll in the streets, they had wandered off the Lid, to the edge of the Zelver district. There, the streets were brightly lit with modern, gas lamps. The shops looked clean and attractive, at least on their fronts, with pristine windows and colorful displays. No loose pigs foraging for food in the gutters in this part of the city.

The Zelverstraat was home to the world renown Toneelstuk Opera House, and on this night of the week, it hosted private representations for a select few. Jesper and Wylan had to pause, as a number of carriage drivers were blocking the street, waiting for their clients to exit the sumptuous building and climb on-board.

Four private bodyguards escorted a blond and visibly pregnant young woman down the front stairs to the sidewalk. Jesper thought it was a bit excessive a security force to protect only one person. The father of that unborn child had to be someone with substantial means, or even greater paranoia.

Jesper didn't have the time to give it any more thought, because he was suddenly, and rather violently yanked to the side by the sleeve of his coat, and dragged with remarkable strength and hurry into the nearest alleyway, which happened to be the one between the opera house and the adjacent tea shop.

“What is g-,” he tried to ask, but Wylan slammed him against the nearest brick wall, grabbed him by the nape of his neck, and pulled him down into a bruising kiss – all teeth and desperation.

Jesper took Wylan by the shoulders and pushed him away just enough so he could speak. “Whoaa! Easy, Tiger!” he laughed. “As much as I appreciate the enthusiasm, I feel like you're trying to devour my whole face. What's gotten into you all of a sudden?”

“Nothing! I just needed to kiss you,” Wylan insisted. He threw a glance above his shoulder, in the direction of the street, as if he was afraid they would get caught. The alley was dark, smelled of rotten tea leaves, had a large pile of broken crates and was littered with shattered porcelain and glass.

“It's a legitimate need,” Jesper agreed, “but you could have kissed me on the street. I don't mind people seeing us. In fact, I rather enjoy showing you off.” Wylan's expression was hard to read in the sharp shadows casted by the surrounding buildings, but there was something definitely tense in the way he breathed, as if each exhale was a bow string about to snap.

“Actually, I… I wanted to do more than just kissing,” Wylan corrected, and he started going down on his knees.

Jesper's eyes widened. “Oh! Okay! But… you don't have to do it here. ” Despite what his reputation might suggest, Jesper was actually mindful of the conditions in which he engaged in intimate activities with people, and he didn't want to treat Wylan like a cheap whore and have him go down on him in some seedy alleyway.

“I've kneeled in worse.” Already, Wylan was pushing Jesper's kilt up, bunching it at his waist with both hands.

“I'm not trying to complain, I'm just ahh! Ngghh, Wylan!” Jesper let out an involuntary moan when his lover pressed his lips on the head of his cock.

“Shhh,” Wylan called him to order.

Jesper bit his lip in remorse. “Sorry ! Sorry!” He so badly wanted to behave.

Perhaps he shouldn't let his lover perform that act on him right now. Not only was Wylan forced to kneel in mud and filth to do so, but from what Jesper knew of him so far, he didn't seem the kind to do things on such whims. Something was going on. But his mind was shutting down, because Wylan's lips were so soft and eager around him, and Jesper was notoriously weak. “Please don't stop,” he whispered, resting his head back against the wall, closing his eyes, toes curling inside his boots. Wylan took him even deeper in the warmth and wetness of his mouth. Jesper did his best to keep his moans low, at the very back of his throat, so they'd not echo out all the way to the street, but staying quiet was difficult…so difficult. He was ready to swear on a foreign god because Ghezen! That kerch boy was skilled. If giving head had been a school subject, he'd swear Wylan must have had a private tutor.

Chapter Text

From Wylan’s experience, very few men liked to find their own taste on someone else's lips. His current lover didn't seem to mind, though. When Wylan stood from his kneeling position, Jesper winded his arms around his neck and pulled him into a kiss, deepening it soon enough with a soft moan.

Wylan was only half-hard in his trousers. As great as it had been to welcome Jesper's wonderful length into his mouth, he had been too scared to truly enjoy it, which was a shame. Earlier in the evening, back at the Slat, as soon as he saw Jesper clad in his brand new kilt; he imagined himself making him lie down on his back across the bed. Wylan would've kissed the inside of his knee, and then trail his lips up his thigh ; relishing in the way his scent got stronger and more enticing with every inch he covered. But in the end, Wylan had spoiled the moment in his hurry to pull Jesper away from the street.

Jesper broke the kiss, but kept Wylan close. “That felt incredible, Sunshine, but I must admit, I didn't peg you as a semi-public sex kind of guy,” he said with a small, bewildered laugh.

Wylan hid his face in the crook of Jesper's neck, his hands grasping at the fabric of his waistcoat. He was still trembling a little, but neither Prior nor Miggson had burst into the alleyway to kill him yet. That meant they hadn't noticed him, and were gone by now, escorting Alys back to the Geldstraat. He was safe, and felt even safer within the protection of Jesper's arms. “You said it yourself, I'm full of surprises,” Wylan pointed out, keeping his voice from coming out shaky and unsure.

“That's true. You really are a marvel,” Jesper said, toying with the short hair at the nape of Wylan's neck. “Do you want me to return the favor?”

Wylan shook his head. “No. Not now.” What he wanted was to burrow himself even further into Jesper’s chest, but they were already pressed to one another, hips to shoulders. It wasn't physically possible to be any closer.

“Are you alright, Wy?” Jesper asked, a hint of concern in his voice.

Wylan stepped back, breaking their embrace. The world felt cold and unforgiving, away from Jesper, but then again, the lack of human contact was something familiar to him. Before Jesper, he had had nobody to take his hand, rub his back, or kiss him better. The day he would have to go cold-turkey from all this undeserved affection would most likely put him in an emotional coma. “Yes, yes. I'm fine; great even.”

“Okay…” Jesper whispered, not sounding convinced. “If you're tired, it's alright. We can head back to the Slat rather than go to the céilí,” he offered. “I can even walk you back to your workshop, if you want.”

Wylan shook his head. He had no intention of spending the night at his workshop. He would not sleep a wink if he had to stay there alone. Besides, the workshop was all the way to the other end of the Barrel. The city's streets were still busy with the late-evening crowd, and the less time they'd spend outside the better. “Which is closer; the Dregs’ or the Green Dragon?”

“The Dragon.”

“Let’s go there, then.”

Jesper shrugged. “Fine by me.”

When they emerged from the alleyway onto the street, the front of the opera house was deserted. All the wealthy spectators had already gone back to their respective mansions in the Geldin District.

It had been a shock for Wylan to see Alys again ; his step-mother, although he could never think of her as such. She was a mere six years older than he was ; Jesper's age, as a matter of fact. The last time he had seen his father's spouse, her pregnancy was barely showing, but since then, Alys’ belly had swollen up to a degree that was now impossible to ignore. It made the whole thing all the more real for Wylan. He was soon going to be replaced. He imagined his father was ecstatic to get a new, unspoiled heir.

Wylan frowned when he realized he had been following Jesper northbound, in the direction of the fourth harbor, rather than to the south-west, toward the Barrel. He waited a bit before voicing his concern. So far, Jesper had never given him a reason not to trust him.

When they took the main street running across Little Ravka, and walked past the Ravkan embassy, Wylan spoke up. “I thought we were going to the Green Dragon pub.”

“No,” Jesper replied, not slowing down. He always walked in this fast yet nonchalant gait only legs as long as his could allow. “It's at the Green Dragon brewery, not the Green Dragon pub. It wouldn’t be subtle enough otherwise.”

Wylan's frown deepened. “ What do you mean ‘not subtle enough?’ Are you bringing me to an illegal gathering?”

“I hate to break it to you, Blossom, but I’m a criminal.” Jesper winked at him. “Going to kaelish dance parties is amongst the tamest crimes I’ve committed so far in my career.”

“I didn't know kaelish parties were illegal…”

Jesper raised an eyebrow. “They are. Céilís have been outlawed since the dockers’ strike last year. I’m surprised you haven't heard of it.”

The dockers’ strike… Of course Wylan had heard of the dockers strike. Back then, it's all his father had been speaking about, for weeks. The kaelish dockers working in the warehouse district and the five harbors were demanding better wages and employment conditions. They tried to unionize to achieve that. Of course, the merchers turning their profit from the shipping trade had no interest in complying to their demands, and Jan Van Eck was chief amongst them. He was more eager than anyone to quash the movement.

It all culminated when a group of dockers tried to vandalize the Van Eck mansion one night – an exchange of fire between the mansion's security staff and the angry mob resulted in two deaths; three if you counted the docker who was later hanged at Hellgate for having killed one of the security guards. That night, the housekeeper had kept Wylan locked up in his bedroom at the very back of the house. He didn't even hear the gunfire and slept through it being none the wiser.

“While the strike was going on, the dockers met during céilís to mobilize and discuss strategies,” Jesper added, unaware of the gears spinning madly in Wylan's brain. “After the Council managed to put an end to the movement, and any unionization attempt along with it, they decided to make céilís illegal in Ketterdam, to discourage further strikes from taking place.”

Wylan had been unaware of that last fact. Jan Van Eck complained a lot about the ingratitude of his work force, but when it came to important political decisions, he never kept Wylan or Alys in the loop. He considered Wylan too much of an imbecile, and his wife too much of a woman to bother asking for their opinions.

“I said ‘the Council,” Jesper added, “but from what I've heard, that law was mostly the initiative of Councilman Van What’s-his-name, the one with the receding hairline, who looks like an angry, molting badger.”

Jesper's words had the effect of a cold shower on Wylan ; like diving from the boat into the canal's icy water once again. He would have laughed at the accuracy of the portrait Jesper painted of his father, but he was sick to his stomach. “Van Eck,” he breathed despite himself, almost inaudible, but Jesper caught it anyway.

“That's him! Councilman Van Eck. It's the same one whose son is missing. If that kid is as bad as his father, I say : good riddance.”

The entirety of Wylan’s blood drained down to his feet, or so it felt like. Good riddance.
His hair stood at the back of his neck, where cold sweat pearled. His ears buzzed as if a swarm of flies was trapped in his skull. He was going to pass out. For sure. He couldn't, though. He had to stay upright. He had to stay on his feet. He had to -

“Are you fine, Wylan?”

He must have gotten a lot paler. “I'm fine. Are we there soon?” He swallowed, and shuddered when Jesper touched his arm.

“Yes, it’s just around the corner.”

“Let's go inside,” Wylan begged. “It's chilly out here. I think the cold is getting to me.” Good riddance.

Jesper put an arm around Wylan and rubbed his shoulder through his coat; something he would never do if he knew who Wylan really was. He would just hate him. “Let's get you inside, then,” he said instead, pulling him along. They walked around a large brick building with several broken windows. Wylan wished he could push Jesper away, scream at him ; tell him to stop caring, stop treating him with kindness. But he was too weak for that, like a bird fallen from the nest, begging to be picked up and put to safety.

The smell of fermented barley and sea salt hit them when they arrived on the side of the brewery and in front of the docks. Down a flight of stairs, concealed behind a pile of wood planks for barrel making, they stopped in front of a metal door.

Jesper knocked five times and a small hatch slid open at eyes level. “Cò tha ann? Comharraich thu fhèin,” asked a female voice in the darkness on the other side.

Jesper cleared his throat. “Jesper Fahey, agus mo leannan Wylan Hendricks.”

Wylan expected the person on the other side to ask more questions, but the door opened and a broad shouldered, red haired woman stepped aside to let them in.

Jesper took Wylan's hand and led him down a long underground corridor carved directly into the rock. It was more like an obstacle course ; a maze of beer barrels piled up to the ceiling. They had to navigate between them like ants in an anthill. Sounds of laughter and conversations grew louder as they progressed, until they reached the entrance of a large storage room, which double wooden doors had been left wide open to welcome the guests.

A good portion of the barrels once stored into this space had been moved to the corridor, or stacked against the walls. Two dozen others were dispersed here and there so people could use them as tables. That left the center of the room free to act as a dance floor. A collection of oil lanterns, hung to the ceiling beams, provided some flickering, orangey light. This whole setting was a stark contrast with the Blue Paradise, its silver chandeliers, angel statues and velvet curtains.

It was just after midnight, and people were only starting to arrive, but there were already at least fifty of them here, some drinking already, others chatting in rapid kaelish. “What am I doing here?,” Wylan thought, “What in Ghezen’s name am I doing here?”; surrounded with people who had good reasons to hold a grudge against his family. “I need a drink… or three,” he told Jesper.

Jesper set his hat down on top of one of the barrels. “Let's begin with one, shall we? You paid for mine at the Paradise, so let me get that for you.” He left Wylan alone to go to the back of the room, where two men had tapped one of the barrels and were pouring dark liquid into mugs.

Wylan ran nervous fingers through his hair and bit his nails. In retrospect, sleeping with Jesper last night, and this afternoon, had been a bad idea. Sleeping with Jesper in the first place was also another mistake he should have never committed. If only he had resisted temptation, that night at the Cumulus, he wouldn't be in such a dire situation right now. If only he had been able to walk away from the sweet advances and the charming smiles, he’d be blissfully unaware of what it was like to spend time in Jesper Fahey’s arms. He wouldn't know what he was going to lose, when Jesper would get bored of him.

Good riddance.

He couldn't go back in time, and undo any of those knots, but maybe he could slip away from the noose, and leave right now, while Jesper was busy getting drinks. Maybe he wouldn't even notice Wylan was gone.

Good riddance.

It was too late, though. Jesper was back already, placing a foamy mug in Wylan’ hands with the kind of smile that could melt stones.

“Thank you,” Wylan whispered, and he brought the mug to his mouth, swallowing one third of the content in one go, hoping he would drown in it somehow. He didn't even like dark kaelish beer all that much, but it was stronger than kerch beer, and the buzzing sound in his ears abated as alcohol seeped through his veins.

On a makeshift stage made of wooden beams aligned on top of crates placed upside down, three musicians were getting ready to lift everyone's spirits. One of them was busy tuning a fiddle. He was fairly young, with flaming red hair, like many other people in this room. The two others were older gentlemen, sporting long beards and newsboy caps. One was distractedly pucking the chords of a mandolin. The other waited, a bodhran drum on his knees.

“There’s no bagpipes?” Wylan asked. “I thought they were a staple of kaelish music.”

Jesper picked Wylan's already empty mug to get him a refill. “Murdagh used to play it,” he explained, making a chin gesture toward a sour-looking man in a black and red kilt, drinking alone in a corner. “But we were worried the pipes would make the music too loud and alert the Stadwatch.”

“I see.” Another crime against kaelish culture, courtesy of the Van Ecks.

Jesper was soon back with new beers. More and more revelers had joined the céilí, and by the time the musicians were ready, the room was packed with about three hundred people.

At the first sounds of music, Jesper’s shoulders straightened, and his whole demeanor changed, as if he was absorbing the drum beat through every skin pore; the blood of his ancestors thrumming under his skin. “Dance with me,” he said, reaching to squeeze Wylan's fingers.

Wylan withdrew his hand and shook his head. “No. I wouldn't know how. I'd be very clumsy.” He attempted a smile. “You go ahead, though.”

Disappointment flashed in Jesper’s eyes for a split second, but the next, a teenage girl with a ridiculously large bow in her curly hair erupted through the crowd. “Jesper! Deanamaid dannsa!” she demanded.

“Sure, Meave,” Jesper replied, good-natured. He let her grab his arm and he followed her to the dance floor.

About a quarter of the guests had flocked there already, and while Wylan wasn't well-versed in kaelish culture, it was a known fact that those people lived to dance. Wylan understood now why his lover had ditched his boots for the evening and chose shoes with thick, hard soles.

The fiddle joined the mandolin and drum for what promised to be a fast-paced reel.

Wylan took an ill-timed sip of his beer, and nearly choked on it, because his eyes landed on Jesper at this exact moment and Sweet mother of Ghezen and all the living saints! That man knows how to dance! Wylan should have expected it, frankly, but nothing could have prepared him to handle that sight. Jesper’s heels hit the flagstone flooring in perfect sync with the music. His movements flowed like a torrent tumbling from a cliff side – a powerful storm on the sea. Jesper danced the same way he handled a gun fight, or fucked Wylan : precise, skillful and self-assured.

Entranced, Wylan could only watch, his face burning hot; his heart a battering ram in his chest. He was captivated by the way the leather of Jesper’s kilt moved with each quick motion.

The music accelerated, but Jesper didn't miss a step, didn't miss a single beat, all the while making his partner twirl in an effortless manner. His face was beaming with unbridled joy ; he was radiant, magnetic; the fire crown of a solar eclipse. Wylan wished he was the one on the receiving end of it. He wanted Jesper’s hand to be on his waist, not on that girl Meave’s. He had made his own bed, though, and now had to lie in it, agonizing.

When the song came to an end, Wylan was the one out of breath and thirsty. He downed half of his pint in a futile effort to regain his senses.

Jesper bowed to his dance partner and excused himself to come back to Wylan. “Phew! That was a fun one! You missed out.”

“I was content with watching,” Wylan said, and it was only half a lie.

“Oh, you were? ” Jesper still had that brilliant smile plastered on his face. A hint of sweat glistened at his temple and on the side of his neck. “And did you see anything interesting?”

“I might have,” Wylan replied, poorly hiding his blush behind his beer mug as he took another sip. The sound of the drum soon announced the beginning of a new dance. “Are you going to go back?” he asked Jesper.

“Not yet. I have a beer to finish.” He lifted his mug for emphasis. “And a man to flirt with.”

Out of reflex, Wylan threw a look over his shoulder, wondering who the man in question was.

Jesper’s laugh snapped him to attention. “I'm speaking of you, silly!” He touched Wylan’s chin, and leaned in to kiss him, but just as their lips were about to touch, his smile faltered. He let go and pulled back, frowning at something behind Wylan.

Wylan turned around to find a man with a square jaw, a handlebar mustache and patchy stubble. “Rach air ais dhachaigh! You don't belong here, radan dorcha,” the man hissed, glaring at Jesper. He leaned over and spat into Jesper's mug.

Wylan expected Jesper to react; punch the guy, draw his gun and press it to his forehead; so he’d know not to mess with a sharpshooter, and much less a Crow. But Jesper did none of those.

His bad deed accomplished, the man turned on his heels with a snigger and left.

Blank-faced, Jesper emptied the last ounce of his spit-laced drink on the stone floor.

Somewhat in shock, Wylan didn't dare speak for a minute. Then, he found his voice again : “What did that man just call you?”

“Don't worry about it.”

“I want to know.”

“Why?”

“Because!” Wylan retorted.

Jesper sighed. “He called me a ‘radan dorcha’ ; a dark rat.”

“What does it mean?”

Jesper rubbed the back of his neck, avoiding Wylan’s gaze. “It's a derogatory term for dark-skinned, mixed-race Kaelishmen like me. Some people reckon we shouldn't be allowed to wear kilts, show our faces at céilís or speak the language.”

“Why? Why do they think that?”

Jesper shrugged. “In Ketterdam, kaelish people are oftentimes seen as low-class citizens and these guys, they think those like me are having it easier, because nobody can tell at first glance that I have blood from the Wandering Isle.” He paused, looking more resigned than bitter. “There’s been a lot more of that since the strike. Tensions are running high. But it’ll go back to normal, at some point, once the dust settles.”

Wylan couldn't tell if Jesper believed his own words. “Still, it's disgusting. They shouldn't say things like that !” He was outraged on his lover’s behalf. “They’ve no right to insult you! You’ve done nothing wrong!”

“Drop it, Wylan,” Jesper demanded, not unkind, but still firm. “It's fine. I don't care what they say, or think.” He waved his hand, as if to chase a fly. “I've gotten used to it. And besides, it’s just a couple bad apples. I won't give them the satisfaction of reacting to their insults.”

The whole situation was a sharp, heavy stone in Wylan’s stomach, and it left a sour taste in his mouth, more akin to guilt than malt. This social tension, this intolerance; it was a result of Jan Van Eck’s own actions and greed. Wylan felt responsible, by association. “I'm so sorry, Jesper.” He wanted to take his hand, but felt like he had no right to seek his touch, or offer his own.

“No need,” Jesper retorted. “I don't want them jerks and their narrow minds to spoil my night, or yours. We're here to have fun.” The musicians were just beginning to play a new tune. “Oh! I love that reel!” Jesper grabbed Wylan's hand, eager to diverge both of their attentions elsewhere. “Dance with me, Wy? Please?”

“I told you! I have two left feet!”

“That's perfect, cause I have two right ones to match yours!”

Wylan frowned, in a last attempt at resistance. “I’ve seen you dance. This is a lie.” There was no way he’d be able to keep up with Jesper and his legs a mile long.

“Come on, your highness,” Jesper teased, wearing his most devilish smirk while tugging on Wylan's arm. “Leave all that kerch stiffness under the table and follow me. “

“I'm not stiff!”

“Can't wait for you to prove me wrong, then!”

“Alright,” Wylan caved in with a sigh, and he let his lover guide him to the center of the dance floor.

He was already panicking a little when Jesper placed a confident hand on his waist, and the other one on his shoulder.

“It's quite simple,” Jesper explained, “the steps go like this : side, side, back, front, back, side, side, center,” he enumerated, demonstrating as he went. “And every time you step forward, I step back so we don't crush each other’s feet.”

“It doesn't look simple at all,” Wylan grunted.

“Try it. You'll see.”

“You can handle this. You've been taught the waltz and minuets,” Wylan reminded himself. This was back when his father thought he’d be someone worth bringing to mercher balls one day. He took a deep breath and tried to emulate what Jesper just did. “Side, side, back, front, back, side, side, back? No. Center. Side, side, back, front, back, side, side, center.”

“You're getting the hang of it, Sunshine, but don't look at your feet.” Jesper's hand moved from his waist to his hip and he drew him closer. Their bodies were almost touching and heat rose to Wylan’s cheeks. “Look me in the eyes,” Jesper instructed. “Let me guide you.”

Wylan obeyed, lifted his head, hoping for his gaze to find anchorage in Jesper's and–
It was too late. He was awestruck. Enamored. Absolutely doomed. He had always wanted someone…anyone….to look at him the way Jesper did, right this instant; with fondness and genuine care. There was even something like pride in those warm, chocolate eyes of his. “You’re in so much trouble, Van Eck,” he told himself. Wylan understood at once that until the day his darkest secrets would be revealed; until the moment it would all come crumbling down; until then, he was not going to be able to let go of Jesper, not of his own volition anyway; not without tearing his heart out.

“You’re getting better,” Jesper complimented again. “Now loosen those sweet hips,” he laughed. “This isn't a waltz!” His necktie lay undone on each side of his collar. The gentle dip at the base of his throat pulsated with every heartbeat, and a lick of sweat shined on his Adam's apple, like morning dew on a ripe fruit.

Wylan tried his best to do as he was bade - he craved Jesper's approval, in a way his father would probably deem pathetic and unfit of a Van Eck. He was gaining confidence, however, letting the music and Jesper guide his steps. And as he did, his lover’s appreciative grin only grew wider.

“Very impressive, Mister Hendricks! See? When you let go, you've actually got a sense for rhythm.”

“Of course I do!” Wylan stuck his chin out. “I'm a musician, remember?”

“That’s very true.”

But just as he allowed himself to boast a little, the music suddenly took a quicker pace, and panic burst again in Wylan's stomach. He kept up, but barely. On the next verse, it accelerated even more. “Ghezen! I'm going to die!”

Jesper, of course, navigated the change of pace like a breeze. “You're not going to die; this is where the real fun begins,” he said with a giggle. “Eyes on me,” he reminded him. “I've got you” and he brought Wylan flush against his front so he wouldn't be tempted to look down at his feet.

When the song came to an end, they were both panting, chest to chest. Despite himself, and despite all the anguish this night brought, Wylan was smiling, light-headed and weak at the knees. Dancing like this, it had awoken a mad, savage spark of happiness; something he didn't even know existed within him. Now he could understand why thrill-chasing Jesper liked this so much.

Jesper released him. “For someone with two left feet, I think you managed pretty well.”

Praises, especially from Jesper: Wylan could bathe in those all day long. They felt like cool balm on old, festering wounds.

Jesper squeezed his hand. “I'm going to go say hello to a couple friends and get us new beers on my way back, is that alright?”

Wylan nodded, still catching his breath. Jesper gave his hand another squeeze and was gone.

Then, Wylan returned to the half-full mug he had abandoned earlier. He drank the rest of it while watching distractedly and from afar as Jesper went to chat with the musicians as they were getting ready for their next piece. Jesper also went to greet Dhòmhnaill the tailor, and then engaged in an animated discussion with the tall, burly woman who had let them in earlier.

Realizing Jesper forgot about his offer to get him a refill, Wylan decided to go fetch it himself. When he came back, he had lost sight of Jesper, and for long minutes, wasn't able to locate him, until he spotted him in the far corner of the room, engaged in a game of dice with two other Kaelishmen.

To pass the time, Wylan watched people dance, and listened to the music, nursing his beer. Once he had finished it, at a loss of anything else to do, he went and got another.

Half an hour later, he was still on his own, and Jesper remained engrossed in his game. In his defense, however, Wylan was easy to forget, and easier to overlook.

Good riddance.

The musicians announced they were taking a short break. They put their instruments away and people left the dance floor.

Not long after, Wylan realized that one of the musicians, the youngest of the trio, was walking toward him with purpose. Their eyes locked and Wylan braced himself, not knowing what kind of interaction this would be.

When the fiddle player reached him, he opened his mouth and some words came out of it : “Haigh! Is tusa Wylan, ceart? Am bu toil leat cluich leinn?”

Wylan's eyes widened. “I'm sorry. I don't speak kaelish.”

“My bad,” he apologized in kerch. “But you’re Wylan, right? Jesper’s boyfriend?”

“Hm yeah. I mean, I'm not his boyfriend, though. I’m just his …date, I suppose.”

The young musician was a bit shorter than Wylan; he had wide, green eyes and constellations of freckles on his pale cheekbones. He was cute enough. Wylan might have pursued him, once upon a time, before he got this sudden and very specific taste for tall, lanky gunslingers.

The musician shrugged. “I wouldn't know. “Lover” and “boyfriend” is ‘’leannan’’ in kaelish : it's the same word.” He took a sip from his beer and set it down next to Wylan's. “Jesper told me you played the flute.”

“I .. I do. Why?”

“Well, I brought mine tonight,” he explained, pointing with his thumb at the makeshift stage and the instrument cases aligned underneath it, “but since I'm busy on the fiddle, and I'm not using it, I was wondering if you’d like to borrow it and play with us?” He extended his hand for Wylan to shake. “I'm Rory, by the way. Nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you too.” Wylan accepted the handshake, but he was reluctant to accept the rest of the offer. “I don't know if I should play tonight, though. I'm not used to such a big crowd.”

He had never performed in front of that many people before. Playing in the street was one thing - people came and went. This, tonight, was a captive audience, and one that expected the tune to be lively enough to dance to it. Back at the Geldstraat, his audience usually consisted of Alys and her two tiny dogs. The dogs fought or humped each other constantly, and music only seemed to make them more frantic. Also, Alys always tried to duet, by singing loudly and out of tune over Wylan’s music. And that was the extent of his experience as far as playing with others went.

“It's all fine. You don't have to,” Rory reassured him. He took his mug, and motioned to leave, but then, something held him back. “ By the way, I’m sorry I addressed you in kaelish first, but in my defense, you do have a very kaelish name.”

The remark took Wylan off guard. He shook his head. “No. I’m Kerch; born and raised in Ketterdam.”

“Perhaps, but ‘Wylan’ is still a kaelish name. It means “remote land” in our language. I have an older brother and an uncle both named Wylan.”

“No,” Wylan protested, with all the strength of his denial. “If that's the case, it means ‘Wylan’ must be a kerch name too.”

Rory was not convinced. Or rather, he was convinced to be right on this matter. “No offense, but I'm not even sure there's a proper way to write your name with the kerch alphabet,” he pointed out. “You must write it like it's pronounced ‘Weelan’, right?”

Wylan's heart raced to a frenzied pace, like everytime reading or writing came up in a conversation. “Yeah. Of course. That's what I do,” he lied, overheating underneath his silk neckerchief. He wanted to remove it, but then everybody would see the love bites Jesper left there.

“And you never thought it was odd?” Rory asked.

“You know what? I've changed my mind,” Wylan declared. He downed the rest of his beer in three long gulps. His head was swimming. “I’d love to try your flute out.”

“Sure! Come with me.”

Rory brought him to the stage and introduced him to the two other musicians, whom, upon closer inspection, had to be brothers. The resemblance was striking. “This is Cormack and this is Callum.”

Wylan gave them polite greetings as Rory fetched his flute case and opened it to reveal the nicely carved low-whistle inside.

“It's a beautiful instrument, but I've never played like this, with the whistle head,” Wylan confessed, already intimidated. His father wouldn't have allowed it. He always said it was too vulgar; too kaelish. And now Wylan found out he had been given a kaelish name. Nothing made sense.

“It's fine. I have a head that goes on it for side-blowing, like a traverse flute, if you're more comfortable that way.” Rory opened a side compartment to the case and pulled out a head joint with the sort of mouth hole Wylan was used to. He had no excuse not to play anymore.

Jittery, his hands trembling and clumsy, Wylan assembled the flute while Rory took his fiddle, and Cormack grabbed his drum tipper underneath his chair. Already, people in the audience were elbowing each other, excited to see a new instrument being added to the entertainment. Wylan felt his face heating up to a point he was afraid he’d combust on the spot. What if his fingers didn't know how to block the holes on the flute anymore? What if alcohol and nervousness messed with his muscle memory, and made him forget everything he had ever learned about music?

Jesper, on the other hand, hadn’t even noticed Wylan standing on the stage, too busy following the rolls of dice on the barrel top. Maybe it was better that way, if he did not look, or listened… but a part of Wylan wanted Jesper to look, listen, and moreover enjoy.

“Do you know any reel?” Rory asked, once Callum was done drinking his beer and had made sure his mandolin was still tuned.

“I know an old country jig. It's called The Three Merry Pine Trees.”

“Perfect. Go ahead and we’ll follow you.”

Wylan brought the flute to his lips, tested the mouth hole with a few blows, just to get the hang of it. Several couples formed on the dance floor, and all were looking at him expectantly. He froze for a dozen seconds, nauseous, and he eyed the double doors at the back of the room, seriously considering the option of running away. In the end, he gathered his last few ounces of bravery and closed his eyes. If he didn't see anyone, and retreated to the darkness underneath his eyelids, perhaps it would help, and it did. He took a slow, measured intake of air, released it into the instrument and the first few notes cascaded from it, bringing the rest of the joyful melody in their wake.

It wasn't long before the other musicians joined in. Out of instinct, Wylan's heartbeat set in sync with the drum. It induced a familiar trance, in which he was inside his own body, and outside of it at the same time. He had become somewhat of an expert at tuning the world out, when his father would corner him after a failed reading lesson, and scream an inch away from his face for long minutes.

Throughout the musical performances of the night, Wylan had observed that it was customary in kaelish dances to accelerate on the last three verses. The dancers would expect it. Wylan was eager to respect the tradition, and since Rory, Callum and Cormack were used to it as well, they had no trouble following Wylan when he picked up pace.

Maybe it was all the liquid courage he'd imbibed tonight, or the thrill of having skilled musicians supporting the melody, but music ascended through his fingers in an uninterrupted flow, like spring sap to the tip of branches.

He snapped his eyes open just as he was holding the last note. There were cheers and whistles. The dancers clapped. Wylan had put smiles on faces and sweat to foreheads.

In the far corner of the room, Jesper was still facing the opposite direction, hunched over the barrel top serving as a dice tray, Nothing indicated that he had turned around even once, or was remotely aware Wylan just played an entire song.

Wylan's shoulders sagged in disappointment, and the flute almost slipped from his hand.
It stung, of course, more than he thought it would, but then again, he had no right to expect Jesper’s undivided attention. He hadn't earned it, not yet anyway, and perhaps he never would.

Rory's voice pulled him back. “You really are a great flautist, Wylan. Where did you learn?”

“Mostly by myself,” he replied without false modesty. “I have a good ear.”

“Even more impressive,” Callum commented, and his brother nodded in agreement.

“Thank you, gentlemen,” Wylan said with a bow of his head. “If you don't mind, I think I should go back to Jesper now.”

“ Sure! But I hope you'll come back and play with us again,” Rory said. “If not tonight, perhaps another time.”

“That would be fun.” He was sincere, although he doubted they’d ever get the opportunity to repeat that experience. "Thank you for lending me your instrument.” Wylan handed Rory his flute with a twinge of regret. The shape and weight of it in his palm was a comforting sensation.

“Anytime.”

Wylan jumped down the stage, and made his way through the dance floor on wobbly feet, the flagstones shifting under him, as if he was trying to stand in a canoe. Perhaps he had drunk more than he should have. A few people clapped his shoulder as he walked past them, telling him things in kaelish that he could only surmise were compliments on his flute skills.

When he finally reached Jesper, he put a careful hand over the back of his arm, reluctant to interrupt the game.

“Hey Wy!” Jesper rejoiced, as if he was seeing him for the first time tonight. “Look! I've won 50 kruge.” He fanned some bills for Wylan to see, grinning with pride.

“That's nice,” Wylan breathed. It was obvious now Jesper had lost track of time, not noticing anything going on outside the game. He had no idea he had just left Wylan on his own for almost three quarters of a bell. And yet, Wylan hastened to extinguish any bitter feelings before they could rise in him.

Jesper put an arm around Wylan's waist and brought him to his side. He planted a peck on his cheek and whispered in his ear: “I think you're my lucky charm. I should bring you with me more often.” Wylan melted in the small display of affection, happy to find out he still was in Jesper's good books.

“Your turn, Fahey,” one of the players said, passing the die over. Jesper grabbed them and presented his closed fist to Wylan. “A kiss for good luck?”

Wylan obeyed and pressed his lips to his knuckles, but before Jesper could play, a scream erupted in the room.

“STADWATCH!! THEY FOUND US! EVERYBODY; GET OUT!!”

Wylan’s stomach dropped and a general commotion ensued.

Jesper was already on his feet, hand on one of his revolvers, the game promptly forgotten. “You stay with me,” he ordered. “I don't want to lose you in the crowd.”

Wylan nodded, swallowing thickly, his spine tensing up with a new kind of fear - perhaps the only sort he had not yet experienced tonight.

A group of people took upon themselves to close the double door and roll beer barrels in front of it to block the entrance. Meanwhile, Jesper and Dhòmhnaill took a ladder lying against the wall and put it up to access a trap door in the ceiling, which likely led to the brewery on the ground floor. Revelers were already massing at the bottom of the ladder. In an attempt to avoid a panic and stampede, Dhòmhnaill called everyone to order, shouting instructions in kaelish.

Before Wylan even had the time to ask, Jesper translated for him :”Women, teenagers and family providers will go first.”

It made sense, but that still meant he and Jesper, as unmarried, childless men, would go last.

The old ladder didn't allow more than one person at a time. And just as the third woman managed to go through the hatch, a loud bang made the double doors tremble.

“The bastards got a battering ram,” someone yelled in kerch.

Wylan tugged on Jesper’s sleeve, his throat tight and hands clammy. “We’ll never get everyone out on time! There’s still 278 people in that room. It takes about 7 seconds for each person to climb through. It's going to take 32.4 minutes to get everyone out!”

Jesper's eyes widened. “How do you-” he started, but Wylan cut him off. “We have to do something. I can't get arrested. I just can't!” If the Stadwatch threw Wylan in jail, they would have to identify and file him, and that would make it so easy for his father to find him, and finish the job.

Another deafening bang prevented Jesper from replying right away. The wood of the doors made an ominous cracking sound.

“Neither of us will get arrested,” Jesper assured him. “I’ll make sure of it.”

Chapter Text

“Hey! You, arsehole! Yes! You!” Jesper shouted, pointing at the guy with the handlebar mustache who insulted him earlier. “Help me get more barrels!” The ones which had already been put against the door to barricade it were starting to leak and break from the pressure. The man nodded and agreed to help, and others joined their efforts.

Bang! Another hit from the battering ram. The door shook on its hinges.

Jesper had made Wylan a promise; to get him out of here unscathed. But as minutes flew by, he became less and less confident that he would actually succeed at keeping them both out of the Stadwatch's claws.

“Open the door!” the muffled voice of a constable came through from the other side. “You're all under arrest! We've got the building surrounded. You've got nowhere to go.”

“Shit,” Jesper cursed, his eyes reflexively seeking Wylan. He was still in his field of vision, helping Rory bring another barrel. The brewery being surrounded meant that even if they made it up the ladder and onto the ground floor, they'd be out of the frying pan, but likely into the fire. There was a way to escape from the roof to the next building, but if the Stadwatch had caught up on that strategy already, they were toast.

Usually, the whole thing would just get sweet adrenaline pumping through Jesper's veins. Some people relished in solving puzzles, Kaz enjoyed coming up with complicated schemes, but Jesper didn't have the patience. This, on the other hand, was the kind of situation in which he thrived – and the deeper the trouble the better. The thing was that now, he had more than just himself to worry about. In that alleyway near the Sprinkaan cafe, only a couple days ago, Kaz had said “make sure he stays safe”, and Jesper was already failing. He was the one who brought Wylan here tonight ; the one who tossed him into that frying pan, and as delicious as Wylan could be, he preferred him raw rather than cooked.

If Kaz ended up having to bail them both out of jail, only a day after he managed to have him exonerated, Jesper knew he would hear about this. And at that point, he wasn't sure what he feared the most between the Stadwatch's jailhouse and Kaz's wrath.

That new row of barrels was not going to hold on for much longer and only a third of the people trapped in the basement managed to exit the storeroom through the ceiling hatch by that point.

The door had metal hinges - they were hanging on by a thread and the Stadwatch was done playing, but Jesper could have used his powers - weld the hinges and the lock, turning them into solid, metallic masses. That would give them some more time to evacuate… but he couldn't just be a durast in front of all these people here. What if they then came to him later, asking for favors - dangerous ones? What if he ended up as an indenture?
“You must promise me, Jesper. You must promise me never to let anyone know about your powers.”
“Yes, Da. I promise.”
“ You know I'm asking you to do this only because I love you so much, huh? All I want is to keep you safe, coineanach.That's what your mama would have wanted; for you to be safe.”
“I know.”
“Good lad. Come give me a hug.”

“Jes! Jesper!” It wasn't his father shaking his shoulder, shouting his name. It was Wylan, his face pale with the danger and urgency of the situation. “I can help!” He showed Jesper two small bottles containing dark, similar-looking powders. “This, and this. It’ll make smoke, a lot of it. I just have to mix them. That should slow them down, maybe even force them to abandon their position.”

“You had chemicals on you?” It was the only, rather dumb thing Jesper managed to offer as a reply.

“Just the emergency ones,” Wylan stated, as if it was the most natural thing in the world to bring a selection of highly reactive substances on a date just in case. “But we have to make a hole through the door so I can drop it on the other side.”

In a spontaneous gesture, Jesper grabbed Wylan's face and kissed him hard on the mouth, tearing an undignified “ummghff” out of him. “You're a genius, Wy!”

“Stop flirting with me and shoot that door!” Wylan urged him.

“Sorry. Okay.” He pulled one revolver out of his holster. “Everybody, step aside.”

Wylan opened one of the bottles and dropped the content of the other into it. “Now!”

Jesper aimed and shot four times at the door, making sure the hole was big enough. “Go!”

Bottle in hand, along with a piece of rag found Saints know where, Wylan hurried to the door and pushed the bottle through it. A broken glass noise followed and he stuffed the rag into the hole to block it.

Sounds of coughing, confused orders and hurried footsteps came from the other side, meaning Wylan’s little concoction had had the desired effect. The banging stopped.

Jesper squeezed Wylan’s shoulder, repeating his words from earlier. “You’re a genius.”

“I’m really not. Now we should concentrate on getting out of here, before the Stadwatch reorganizes.”

“Yes, you’re right.”

By that time, two ingenious women had found a way to strengthen the ladder by using the beams from the makeshift music stage, along with pieces of broken barrels. Now, three people could be on the ladder at once, which made the evacuation process much swifter.

Wylan in tow, Jesper went to Dhòmhnaill, who was standing at the foot of the ladder, making sure people went through the ceiling hatch in an orderly fashion. “The Stadwatch said they were surrounding the building,” Jesper urged him. “We don't know how many there are. Maybe they're bluffing, maybe not. And now that Wylan smoked a couple of them out, there’s even more officers on the streets around the brewery. You should send me up there right now. I’m useless here. I have my revolvers. I can protect our people. But Wylan comes with me.”

Dhòmhnaill took no more than two seconds to think about it. “Okay. You and your boy can go.”

“After you,” Jesper offered Wylan, but just as he put his foot on the first step, Jesper closed his fingers around his forearm to catch his attention. “ Listen, I don't know what it’s like up there,” he warned him, “so, once we’re on the ground floor, you stay behind me at all times, understood?”

Wylan blinked at him. Jesper took that as a yes. He had to. They were running out of time.

When Jesper emerged through the hatch and onto the brewery's ground floor, it was the pungent smell of hops and fermented barley that hit him first. The space was dark and he had a hard time distinguishing anything at first. His hands found the comforting handles of his revolvers as his eyes adjusted. Fortunately, the moon was full outside, and the sky was unexpectedly cloudless for this time of year. After a minute or so, he was able to find his bearings, and assess the space in the silvery light coming through the windows.

There was everything here one could expect to find in a brewery : a large pile of empty barrels stacked on their side in a wood pen by the main door, the workers’ grain shovels aligned to the brickwall, wheelbarrows crusted with mash waste, a few boilers to heat water and heaps of coal to fuel them. The skull of a giant elk, the national symbol of the Wandering Isle, was mounted over the door, with its antlers spanning nearly four meters. The center space of the brewery, behind Jesper, was mostly occupied by gigantic vats and tanks for beer making, some of them so large they nearly touched the ceiling. The vats were blocking the sight to the southern end of the building. In an ideal situation, Jesper would have preferred to know the whole layout before he had to engage in a potential gunfight, but this was far from an ideal situation.

In the meantime, some more people had climbed through the hatch.

“What do we do now?” Wylan asked.

But before Jesper could answer, the sound of commotion and exclamations came from the mezzanine floor above them; where the brewery stored the grains. Then, they heard a loud, clattering noise in the east alleyway next to the building.

There were footsteps coming down the stairs and appeared Maggie, the woman who was minding the door when Wylan and he arrived at the party earlier. “We can't escape from up there anymore,” she announced. “The constables found grappling hooks on the docks, and they tore down the ladder we were using to make people get to the next rooftop. We've nowhere to go now. They trapped us like rats”

Jesper threw a glance at Wylan. His big doe eyes appeared even bigger in the dim light. He was nervously playing with the buckles of his coat's straps. If they were all cornered rats, Wylan was a little mouse, and Jesper was determined not to let the Stadwatch catch it. “There must be a service door at the other end of the building,” Jesper said. “We might be able to get out through there.”

Maggie shook her head. “We've checked from the roof. They've blocked it with a cart and there are several agents watching it. I feel like they're plotting something. I don't know what, but it can't be good.”

He tightened his grip on his revolvers. “Then, we have to find another way ou-”

BANG!

The damn battering ram again, and this time, they were using it on the brewery's front door. So this is what they were plotting: just a repetition of the previous nightmare. There was only one silver lining in this otherwise bad situation. “There's no way they dispatched enough agents to arrest all of us,” Jesper pointed out. The Stadwatch wouldn't have sent more than a dozen men to break out an illegal gathering.

“I've spotted at least twenty of them around the building,” Maggie informed him, as the battering on the door only grew louder, harder and more insistent. She didn't seem to harbor much hope.

Jesper swallowed. “Twenty?” Why so many? There was only one possible answer : the Stadwatch was under pressure to get as many kaelish troublemakers in jail tonight, and that pressure could only come from one person : Councilman Van Eck himself.

The agents trying to break into the brewery had a lot more room to maneuver their battering ram out there than they did in the basement. The doors were going to smash open in less than a minute, and Jesper found himself powerless to prevent it.

As more people had come through the hatch, Jesper shouted at the ones still downstairs to stay there and lay low, and he closed the trap door. They would be safe, at least for a bit. After that, it was anyone's game. Perhaps, after all the smoke from Wylan's compound would have dissipated, they could escape from the underground corridor, but that remained uncertain.

On the ground floor, a young woman was crying in her husband’s arms. Most of the revelers trapped here were petrified, holding on to each other like doomed travelers on a sinking ship. “Hide anywhere you can,” Jesper ordered them. “I’m gonna try to distract them the best I can, meanwhile, you run through that door the first chance you get!” People obeyed him, scattering around the brewery, hiding under vats and behind the boilers.

Jesper twirled his revolvers, eyes fixated on the entrance. It wouldn't be long now before the doors would break like a dam, unleashing an unknown amount of chaos. He threw a quick glance at Wylan over his shoulder: “you stay with me,” he reminded him.

BANG!
BANG!
BANG!
CRACK!

The doors were thrown open with the force of the constables' common efforts.

From a rapid count of their silhouettes against the canvas of the moonlit street, Jesper reckoned there were at least fifteen of them. As soon as the first three crossed the threshold, Jesper aimed at the elk skull over the door and shot at the metal bracings keeping it mounted to the wall. The skull came tumbling down on them. One of the constables cried in pain when the sharp tip of an antler pierced through his shoulder. The two others were hit on the head by it, but they had helmets on. It would not throw them off for long. The momentary distraction, however, gave Jesper enough time to spot his next target.

Five more Stadwatch agents had already made their way across the fallen elk and over their stunned comrades, yelling at everyone in the brewery to surrender.

Surrendering had never been Jesper’s style, though. Instead, he aimed and shot at the latch of the wood pen keeping the pile of empty barrels locked in place. The latch broke, releasing the pile. The barrels rolled down toward the intruders like a stampede, knocking at least two of them in their path. In the confusion, five or six of the kaelish people slipped past the agents and reached the street. But once again, Jesper’s little show of marksmanship would not be enough to incapacitate the entirety of the police force.

Jesper groaned in frustration. Everything would be over already, if only he could kill those constables. Fifteen bullets ; fifteen motionless bodies. As easy as that. But the agents were not here to murder anyone; and Jesper had enough honor not to dispatch people who weren't coming with lethal intents. Besides, there was a difference between killing lawless gangsters in a street fight, and killing actual policemen, no matter how corrupt they could be. He would find himself hanging at the end of a rope on the walls of Hellgate for that crime, and not even Kaz would be able to pull enough strings to prevent that. He doubted the judges Jan Van Eck held in his pocket would show mercy to a gang member, and, moreover, to kaelish Barrel trash like him.

As predicted, only temporarily inconvenienced by Jesper's efforts, the constables were charging again, batons drawn, ready to bring them down on the ribs of anyone who resisted. The real possibility that Wylan might get hurt made Jesper turn around, only to be confronted with a decidedly empty Wylan-shaped space behind him.

Jesper’s heart dropped so heavily in his chest it might have made a thud. “Wylan!” he shouted, amidst the chaos and confusion, looking for any trace of him. The constables were already dragging defenseless people from underneath the beer vats. One agent was kicking a middle-aged woman in the stomach as she was writhing in pain on the ground. He lifted his baton to hit her over the head. Jesper released a shot, using his small science to make the metal bullet meet with the metal wedding band on the constable’s hand. The man dropped his weapon with a roar of horror. It fell to the ground, along with the severed finger.

“Wylan!!!” Jesper yelled again, louder this time, his stomach stuck in his throat. Where was he? Where the fuck was Wylan? Jesper momentarily forgot about his own safety. Dire mistake. He peeked toward the entrance of the brewery, just long enough to see an officer throw a dark object in his direction. It hit his shoe. A cylinder. Too late.

The stun grenade detonated, trusting a blade of blinding light directly into Jesper’s unprotected eyes. He staggered on his feet, disoriented. The deflagration had drilled a high-pitched tinnitus across his skull. It drowned any other noises and made him fear he had both ear-drums punctured. He still had his guns in his hands, but they were rendered useless by the large, bright spot at the center of his vision, preventing from aiming at anything.

Another grenade exploded somewhere to his right hand side.

Deprived from his senses, and for the first time since crossing the Fold, Jesper panicked ; with true, cold, heart-wrenching fear.

Soon enough, he felt the tip of a gun muzzle pressed on the back of his neck. “Put down your weapons, slowly,” the officer’s voice ordered. Jesper prayed to all the living saints that Wylan was safe ; that he’d manage to escape that hell, even if it was without him.

BOOM! Another explosion, somewhere at the back of the brewery, ground shaking and much louder than the stun grenades.

The cold touch of the gun muzzle left the skin of his neck for a split second, the officer being startled by the deflagration, and Jesper took this unexpected opportunity to spin around and deliver a blind and desperate uppercut to the policeman’s jaw. The punch connected. With a cry of pain, the man fell backwards.

With about thirty percent of his vision now recovered, his heart thumping so hard it made him nauseous, Jesper fled the scene, not out of the door, but in the opposite direction, to the back of the brewery. Running toward the sound of an explosion might be the least careful thing anyone could have done in this situation, but where things were blowing up, there usually was a demo man to be found.

At the other end of the building, with most of his vision now cleared, Jesper was greeted by the sight of a gaping hole in the brick wall, allowing people to escape toward the docks. This could only be Wylan’s handiwork.

Jesper hurried through the breach and out of the building, with Maggie, and thirty or so of their fellow countrymen and women.

A few stadwatch agents were trying to hold their position on this side of the building, but they soon found themselves outnumbered, and made the wiser choice to retreat toward the street when a group of vindictive kaelish dockers started chasing them with bricks and metal piping from the torn up wall.

However, Jesper was not interested in getting a piece of the action. What he wanted was to find the elusive brat he called his lover; the one who was currently taking all the fun out of the adrenaline rush.

Since he knew what he was looking for, it took him less than two minutes to spot a messy head of curls behind a spool of mooring rope the size of a doghouse. Jesper barreled to Wylan’s hiding spot, grabbed him by the back of his coat and dragged him away from the scene like a disapproving parent, until they were two blocks down the harbor, in relative safety, between a fishmonger’s shop and a shipwright’s office.

“Let go of me!” Wylan protested.

It took him a moment to find his balance back when Jesper finally obliged.

“What were you thinking?!” Jesper growled, towering over Wylan, jawline set in a hard line. He flexed his right hand, trying to drive away some of the pain from the knuckles he had bruised when they collided with the officer’s jaw.

Wylan crossed his arms to face him, tottering, as if trying to stand his ground on the deck of a storm-tossed ship. “You and the others needed a diversion, and an exit, so I provided those. You're welcome!”

“Well, that was stupid!” Jesper raged on, perhaps louder than he should have, and most likely louder than safety prescribed. With a brisk gesture, he pointed a finger in the direction of the brewery. “The Stadwatch would have beaten you to a pulp if they figured out you were the one blowing up that wall!”

“They don’t know it was me! It worked out! What in Ghezen’s name are you complaining about!?”

“I told you to stay next to me!!”

Wylan was getting equally as aggravated. “I don't need you! I can fend for myself!”

“Can you, though!?”

“What are you insinuating?”

“Kaz asked me to protect you! I'm just trying to do my job here, and you’re making it much more difficult than it has to be!”

“Is that what I am to you, a job!?” Wylan’s tone caught fire, and somehow, it matched Jesper’s in coldness as well. “I'm a task Kaz gave you!?”

Jesper threw his hands up in frustration. “That's not what I mean and you know it !!”

Unexpectedly, all the fight and spunk in Wylan's demeanor drained out of him at once. His face fell and he recoiled, casting his gaze downward, wringing his hands. “You’re right. I shouldn't have said that.”

A look so contrite on such a pretty face cooled Jesper's temper down in an instant. He heaved a long, shaky sigh. “Me too. I'm sorry.” The ice in his voice thawed. “I shouldn't have scolded you. That was unfair.” He rubbed his face with both hands, as if the gesture could erase the harsh words already spoken.

He had lost his mind a bit there, from the fear that anything could have happened to Wylan, and that it would be his own fault. The last thing he wanted, however, was to hurt him while trying to keep him out of harm's way. Strangely enough, the knowledge that Wylan was able to defend himself made Jesper want to protect him even more, as absurd as it might seem.

“What you did tonight was pretty brave,” Jesper admitted. “It’s just that…when I lost sight of you, not knowing where you were anymore, if you were hurt…I didn't like that…at all.”

Wylan looked up, hazel eyes full of innocent wonderment. “You were worried about me?” The question sounded different than the last time he had asked it, that night in front of a mausoleum in Black Veil Cemetery. There was no trace of teasing. It was a true, eager question - a plea even.

And this time around, Jesper didn't try to deflect. “Of course I was worried about you!”
He stepped forward, arms open, eager to provide comfort and a refuge, should Wylan forgive him. To his utter relief, it took less than a heartbeat for Wylan to lock his arms around his waist and pressed his face into his shoulder.

“Please, don't do that again,” Jesper whispered in soft, chestnut curls, leaving a kiss there, his voice more affected than he would have liked it to be.

“I can't make that promise,” Wylan replied in all honesty, his voice muffled by the wool of Jesper’s waistcoat.

“I know.”

They stayed like this for a moment, before Jesper stepped back from their embrace.

“Let's get out of here, okay?”

“O-okay.”

Wylan hesitated, then took a few, staggering steps in the wrong direction.

“It's the other way,” Jesper pointed out.

“Oh.”

Jesper frowned. “Are you drunk, Wylan?”

Wylan pulled a sheepish face, worrying at his bottom lip. “Just tipsy, maybe?‘'

“You're tipsier than tipsy, I reckon.” The rush of adrenaline might have delayed the symptoms, or maybe, Jesper had been too caught in the action himself to acknowledge Wylan's glassy eyes, or the fact he was unsteady on his feet and slurring his words. “How many beers did you have exactly?”

Wylan squinted as he tried to recollect. “Not that many. Like four or five maybe?”

“Saints, Wy! Featherweight like you, on an empty stomach? It's enough to get you completely hammered! And you handled explosives in that state?”

“I had to. I had to help those people,” Wylan stated. “I'm out of red phosphorus now,” he mused, more for himself than for Jesper's sake. His eyes wandered around the alleyway, as if a fresh supply of said chemical could be hidden somewhere.

“Come on. Let's get you back to the Slat. You can lean on me,” Jesper offered, putting his arm around Wylan’s shoulders and pulling him along toward the street. “I'm going to make my mom's secret recipe, so you dont wake up with a bad hangover tomorrow.”

They walked six blocks like this, with Wylan safely tucked under Jesper’s wing, their hips bumping together with every step. Jesper would have a bruised hip on top of bruised knuckles, but he wasn't going to complain.

They had the luck not to encounter any trace of the Stadwatch en route. It was as if they had disappeared from the neighborhood altogether. Had Dhòmhnaill, Maggie, Rory, or any of his other friends been arrested in the end? He couldn't worry about them. He had to put Wylan to bed.

“Jes?”

“Yeah?”

“Do I have a kaelish name?”

The random nature of the question tore a laugh out of him. “Hendriks? It's as kerch as it gets. It's almost stereotypically kerch, if you ask me.”

“I'm speaking about ‘Wylan’.”

“Ah. Well, yeah. That's kaelish for sure. I just assumed you had kaelish ancestry in your bloodline, or maybe your parents just liked kaelish names.”

Wylan pulled the face of someone who just swallowed a slug on a dare, not that Jesper would know what that looked like, of course. Silence fell between them for a bit. “I don't really know my family on my mother’s side,” Wylan admitted, just as they were reaching the edge of the Lid.

There was an heaviness, a gravity to that admission, and Jesper was afraid to say the wrong thing. “That’s a shame… for them, I mean.”

“If there's any of them left alive, I doubt they even know I exist.”

This time, Jesper remained quiet, because what could he say? What was there to say? He didn't know much about Wylan's family, but from what Jesper had gathered in-between the lines, this was a family tree bleeding from numerous ax cuts.

They arrived at the Dregs’ house just as the bells from Sank Piotr's church chimed three in the morning. The Dreg’ club was closed, and Jesper had to fish his keys out of his trousers pocket to get in. A club that didn't have to forcefully throw customers out at three was a failing business, but with Kaz having taken over from Haskell, Jesper did not doubt his boss's savvy mind was soon going to turn things around.

In the meantime, the bar room was eerily quiet. The empty chairs and tables could have had an inch of dust covering them, it wouldn't have looked out of place.

Jesper led Wylan by the hand through the revolving doors leading to the shabby kitchen at the back of the building. It was dark ; darker than the brewery. Jesper started groping around a shelf, in search of matches as Wylan struggled to remove his coat. Doing so, he bumped into a chair, sending it clattering on the tiled floor.

“Careful!” Jesper warned.

“I am being careful,” Wylan protested, managing to finally remove his arms from his sleeves. “It's these chairs. They're unstable!” And as if on cue, he draped his coat on the back of another chair, which also toppled over from the weight.

“Shhhshhh, stop being so loud,” Jesper admonished. “You're gonna wake everyone!”

“I'm not loud, it's you who's loud,” said Wylan, loudly.

Finally, Jesper's fingers closed around a flint lighter behind what he assumed was a jar of marmalade. He lit the first candle on the shelf and ew ! not marmalade, but pickled herring instead, with their white, dead eyes, floating around in vinegar and brine; another Kerch “delicacy” he had never been able to stomach.

When the lighting was sufficient, Jesper removed his hat, left it on the counter and started rummaging through the cupboards. Wylan sat on a bar stool, elbows resting on the kitchen island, watching him with half-lidded eyes, chin propped in his hands.

“Perfect!” Jesper exclaimed, brandishing a medium-sized kitchen pot in victory.

Wylan jumped out of his skin when someone cleared their throat behind him.

“What the hell are you two doing?”

From the kitchen's door frame, Kaz assessed the scene with a displeased expression, his face still battered from its encounter with Rollins’ fists. He was bare feet, dressed in a long, velvet, wine-red night robe, held his cane in one hand, and a gun in the other.

“My brother in Ghezen, what are you doing?” Jesper replied, making a chin gesture toward the loaded gun.

Wylan, on the other hand, was biting the inside of his cheeks, on the verge of bursting out in nervous laughter. Seeing Kaz Brekker in a bathrobe would do that to a man. To the unaccustomed eye, it felt a bit like catching a glimpse of a wild panther wearing a tutu.

“I was getting ready to fight intruders,” Kaz said, his frown deepening. “I thought we were being robbed by the loudest, lousiest thieves I ever came across.”

“Well, as you can see, we're not thieves,” Jesper replied, waving his kitchen pot to illustrate his point.

Kaz uncocked his gun with a glance at the two chairs Wylan had not bothered picking up from the floor. “That doesn't explain why you're here rearranging the furniture at this hour of the night.” He had probably been expecting gang members still loyal to Haskell, or even some Dime Lions, trying to break in and vandalize the place in retaliation.

“It's my fault,” Jesper said quickly, fetching water from the kitchen tank to fill his pot. “I'm quite drunk and Wylan was kind enough to help me get home.”

Kaz’s eyes traveled from Jesper to Wylan, piercing, analyzing. “Sure. Looks the other way ‘round to me.”

Wylan wriggled on his stool, uncomfortable under the scrutiny of that icy blue stare. “That's not what you think. Jesper was just being a good friend. Nothing more.”

Kaz sighed, like someone confronted with the misdeeds of unruly children. “Go to bed, you two, before you break something, or set the house on fire.” He turned on his heels and headed back upstairs without a word more.

Jesper put the pot on the stove.

Even with Kaz now gone, Wylan’s discomfort didn't seem to ease. “I think Kaz knows about us,” he pointed out.

“Yeah, I'm aware.” With the flint, Jesper lit the gas stove, taking the opportunity to warm his cold, sore fingers by the flame.

“Are you mad ?” Wylan asked with a small voice.

Jesper turned to give him a reassuring, if tired smile. The exertion of dancing, then engaging in a gunfight, and the emotional toll of a lovers’ quarrel were starting to catch up on him. “Nah. He would have found out soon enough. And honestly, I don't want to sneak around. It's exhausting.”

“What are you making, exactly?” Wylan asked, changing subject with a head tilt toward the pot on the stove. “What's in your mom's recipe?”

“Hold on.” Jesper reached into his coat's inner pocket and pulled a tin box out of it, opening it for Wylan to peek inside. “When they chew jurda, people usually consume the petals and throw away the rest, but I always keep the center of the flower and the little bits of stalk that comes with it. It has very handy medicinal properties. My mom used to boil the jurda stalks into tea for my dad, when he'd gone partying with his friends in Cofton and came back with his arse over his head. The morning after, he was as fresh as dew.”

“Quite the party animal, your old man?” Wylan asked with a drowsy smile.

“He used to be, yeah.”

“Seems like the apple hasn't fallen far from the tree,” Wylan teased.

“You wouldn't think that if you met him. He's a lot calmer now.” Picking the little bits of stalk between his thumb and forefinger, Jesper let three pinches of them fall into the pot. Now, he had to keep it boiling for eight to ten minutes, until the tea turned an amber color. “It all changed after my mom died. He had to handle the pressure of raising me on his own. ”

“And I’m sure you were a handful,” Wylan remarked, tender rather than malicious, “but I reckon he did a pretty good job of it in the end.”

Jesper snorted as he stirred the infusion with a spoon. “Shall I remind you that you're speaking to a gang member and an actual outlaw?”

“My point still stands.”

Jesper clenched his teeth, and the lingering pain in his hand had nothing to do with it. If Wylan knew the whole truth, he wouldn't be so benevolent.

The Crow Club and the Slat blew up a few days ago, and with it, a pile of envelopes Jesper kept locked in a desk drawer. Those were all of the letters Colm Fahey sent his son over the last five months. The envelopes used to contain cash, checks and letters. Only the letters remained. Jesper had spent the cash, cashed the checks, read some of the letters, but replied to none. Colm remained convinced his son was busy pursuing a business degree at the reputable University of Ketterdam; too caught up in his studies to reply to his letters in a timely fashion. In fact, Jesper hadn't set foot on campus grounds in almost a year and a half. The money his father sent toward his tuition had been gambled away to the last Kruge. “It’s shame that eats men whole.” This was one of those suli proverbs Inej liked to repeat so often even Kaz started using it. Jesper used to feel the piercing ache of shame’s teeth around his throat every time a new letter came with a stamp from Novyi Zem’s royal postal service. By now, though, there wasn't much left of him for shame to nibble on.

The tea having attained the desired color, Jesper poured it through a sieve into two cups; one for Wylan, and one for himself. He wasn't exactly at risk of getting a hangover, but he still needed the hydration.

When Jesper placed the warm, fragrant cup into Wylan's hands, he was rewarded with a gentle smile and a sweet “Thank you so much, Jes”. The thought occurred to him that Wylan might, in fact, be too good for him; too forgiving, too loving, too trusting. Inevitably, he was going to spoil that ; spoil him ; maybe corrupt him even. It left an awful, pickled herring taste in his mouth, so much so that it prompted Jesper to grab that thought, force it into an opaque bottle, and lock it in a desk drawer somewhere in the most obscure room of his mind, along with his father's letters and everything else he wished to forget.

The tea was still too hot, but Jesper swallowed four gulps of it anyway. The burning sensation on his tongue and in his throat had a grounding effect.

“Let's get you to bed now,” he said, fifteen minutes later, after they had finished drinking their tea in silent companionship.

“Your bed?” Wylan asked, doe-eyes all hopeful, if a little unfocused.

Jesper chuckled fondly. “Yes, I meant my bed.”

“Is that stairwell weirdly constructed, or is my head still spinning?” Wylan muttered, as Jesper helped him upstairs.

“You’re still drunk, love. That's all.”

“But I thought your tea was magic?”

“Not magic,” Jesper corrected, opening the bedroom's door to let Wylan in. He took his tie off and wrapped it around the handle before he closed it. “It's going to keep you from suffering a bad headache and nausea tomorrow, as well as preventing both our breaths from smelling like the Geldcanal after Sankt Emerens’ day, but it's not going to make you sober up any quicker.”

Inside the bedroom, someone had already lit the oil lamps for them. Jesper thanked Kaz in mind, although his boss would probably argue that his only motivation was to prevent them from stumbling blindly in the dark and causing more havoc.

“I feel fine,” Wylan stated, eyebrows drawn, as if convincing himself took a good amount of concentration and effort.

“You're still clinging to me to stay upright, though,” Jesper pointed out, with a touch of amusement. One of Wylan’s hands was indeed grasping a fistful of his waistcoat.

“Maybe I just like to be close to you.” The lingering effects of alcohol colored his cheeks with an adorable blush.

“I'm not complaining, you know,” Jesper replied, gathering him into his arms properly and leaning in to catch his lips and a slow, unhurried kiss. He tasted like kaelish beer and Jurda - floral and spicy- like nice memories, but with something else that was decidedly and uniquely Wylan.

Another hand came to latch onto Jesper's clothes, asking for more closeness. With a soft exhale, Wylan broke the kiss, cocking his head to the side to offer his neck. It was pale and graceful, like the one of a ballet dancer: with taut, marzipan-colored skin and lean muscles, and Jesper was unable to look away, or resist the temptation. He tasted it, reveling in the way Wylan arched up, receiving the attention with earnest whimpers, as his hips sought the press of Jesper's against them.

Jesper's trailed soft kisses up Wylan's neck. He bit down his earlobe and tugged on it gently. Wylan would look so good with an earring, or, even better : a piercing through one of his lovely nipples. Jesper could toy with it with his lips, and then soothe the sting with his tongue. The idea alone was enough to arouse him. What was it with him and this fantasy of covering Wylan in jewelry? Perhaps, it was because he had likened him to a prince ever since their first encounter, and he just wanted him to look the part?

Desire rose in Jesper in steady waves. He needed Wylan naked, legs open, sprawled on the bed in such a way that he could see his face : see his rosy lips bloom open with a gasp when he’d bury himself into the tight heat of him.

And yet…

“We shouldn't take this any further tonight, darling,” Jesper whispered in regret. “I’m sorry.”

Chapter Text

Wylan pulled back; surprise and dejection painted on his face. “Why? … You don't want me?” The word “anymore” hung in the air, unsaid and deafening at the end of the sentence.

“Of course I want you,” Jesper hastened to correct. “I've wanted you even before I knew what you looked like. But that’s not the point.” Maybe he ought to feel bad, to tease and then refuse, but it was for the best. He brought Wylan's hand to his mouth, kissed the inside of his wrist, inhaling the scent of his skin, and then his palm. “If I pressed your hand between my legs right now, you'd be well aware of exactly how much I want you.”

“Press my hand between your legs,” Wylan demanded, dark pupils blown wide in the soft glow of the oil lamps.

After a short hesitation, Jesper obeyed, making it slide down his stomach, and then even further, until he could place it to the front of his kilt. Almost on instinct, Wylan's practiced fingers cupped the throbbing line of his cock through the leather.

“Jes,” Wylan breathed, half a confession, half a plea. “You’re so hard already…”

“Of course I am, treasure.” Jesper laced their fingers together and placed them over his heart. “But nothing’s going to happen tonight, though.”

“Why?”

“Because you're drunk, and I'm fully sober.”

“I have a hard time believing you've never had sex with a drunk person before,” Wylan countered.

“I have, and also regretted it. Besides…” He reached around Wylan's waist and stroked the curve of his backside. “I went pretty rough on you this afternoon, and without any preparation whatsoever, as per your request,” he reminded him, running his forefinger up and down the seam at the back of Wylan's trousers. “You're probably still sore.”

“I don't feel it.”

“That's precisely my concern.”

“But Jes…I just….I mean,” Wylan stuttered, "I need you.”

Jesper left a soothing kiss on his forehead. “I know, sweetheart. I know.”

“It’s not fair.”

“No. It’s not. I agree.”

Jesper could have repaid the favor Wylan performed earlier in the opera house's alleyway. He could have dropped to his knees right there and then, and take Wylan’s elegant cock into his mouth, bringing him at least that modicum of relief. The thought of being allowed to lick the impossibly silky flesh down there made Jesper’s own erection twitch with interest, but if it was for Wylan to be left with only a vague and foggy memory of it the next morning, it wasn't worth it. It would feel too much like taking advantage of him in a moment of vulnerability, where consent was shaky at best. Inej would have his head if she ever learned he did something like that. It was better to wait for a moment when there would be clarity and firmly set boundaries on both sides.

“You're very attractive, Wy,” Jesper felt the need to reassure him further. “Believe it or not, wanting you comes very naturally to me. But tonight, that nice body of yours should get its beauty sleep. Tomorrow, however, we'll have all the time in the world. You can ask me anything, and I'll give it to you. And when I say ‘anything’, I truly mean ‘anything’.”

“Is that a promise?”

“Yes. Now let's get some rest, huh?”

“I know you said no sex,” Wylan bargained, batting his lashes at Jesper, “but…could you at least cuddle me for a bit until I fall asleep?”

“Of course. It goes without saying.”

***

It might have been past ten bells when Jesper woke. He did not open his eyes right away. Instead, he took the time to soak in the autumn sunlight coming from the window and tickling his right forearm over the quilted blanket. Outside, on the street, a carriage driver was cursing another with a strong accent from Lij, a vendor peddled his beetroots and pumpkins, and a boy was announcing the newest edition of the Ketterdam Gazette; the noise of the Barrel in all its lively, raucous glory. It contrasted with the soft, regular breathing coming from his right side. The slight dip in the mattress, and the warmth traveling underneath the covers to caress Jesper's hip and leg indicated that Wylan was still there, asleep.

With a lazy smile, Jesper opened his eyes and stretched, slow and careful, as not to wake Prince Charming just yet. He hitched himself up the bed to rest his shoulders against the wrought iron headboard, placing a pillow behind him for comfort.

Wylan was lying on his back, head to the side, face towards him, one of his hands resting over his heart. He was wearing Jesper’s shirt. They had gone to bed naked, but Wylan must have picked it up from the floor during the night, as the temperature dropped. Jesper’s fond gaze brushed over the appealing curve of his bottom lip and his long, dark lashes fanning over pale cheekbones. He looked gently ruffled, with a small divot between his eyebrows, as if solving complicated equations in his sleep.

Then, came the realization that Jesper had never seen Wylan like this before - in the morning, still asleep in bed with him. He had witnessed him taking a nap on the train to Applebroek, and then resting in the hay cart on their way back to Ketterdam, but it couldn't compare exactly. This was cozy; awfully domestic. He could get used to it.

Wylan began to stir and blink in the sudden brightness.

Jesper could have pretended he hadn't been staring, but he chose to be quite blatant about it instead. He wanted Wylan to know he was being admired. “I must admit, I quite like the way you look in the morning.”

With a drowsy hum, Wylan rubbed the slumber from his eyes, pawing at his face like a kitten: being entirely too adorable to resist. This compelled Jesper to put his fingers underneath his chin, and stir his head up to steal a kiss. He tasted like sleep and a hint of jurda, and Jesper caught himself liking it. Then, he moved his arm up, inviting Wylan to snuggle up to his side.

There were no visible traces of last night’s intoxication left in his demeanor. Aditi’s tea had worked wonders again. However, Jesper was mindful of the fact Wylan hadn't eaten anything since the few donuts and pastries from the bakery the evening before. He himself was getting peckish. “Are you hungry?” he asked, rubbing Wylan’s arm once he’d settled against him, his head on his chest. “Nina once mentioned a breakfast place that sets waffles on fire… or was it sausages? Nah I don't know. I can't remember ; I wasn't really listening-”

“I'm-” Wylan interrupted. “I don't think I'm really ready for breakfast just yet.”

Jesper emitted a “oh” of realization when Wylan lifted his head. There was something mischievous and seductive in the rich, honeyed darkness of those eyes, which left little doubt to Wylan's intentions. Obviously, he hadn't forgotten the promises uttered in the wee hours. Breakfast could wait, then.

This time, it's Wylan who initiated the kiss, holding on to the nape of his neck, trying to pull Jesper on top of him. The boy truly had a one-track mind, but Jesper was more than happy to be led down that very track. He deepened the kiss, cupping Wylan's face, tracing the seam of his lips with an inquisitive tongue. He then let his hand travel down to where he hoped he could slip it underneath the light fabric of the shirt. Already, he was aching for everything Wylan’s body had to offer and–

His quest for bare skin was interrupted by the harsh knocking of a cane against the bedroom door. For the love of Saints! Kaz! Not now!

“NO!!!” Jesper yelled in protest, pulling away from Wylan and pointing an accusatory finger in the direction of the noise.

“Downstairs, now,” Kaz's voice ordered. “Ravka needs saving.”

Jesper pinched his lips in discontent, glaring at the door, then groaned: “can't Ravka wait, Iike, five minutes maybe?” He knew he wouldn't get a response. Instead, he got a pillow shoved in his face.

“Five minutes, Jesper?” Wylan sputtered, scandalized. “That's the treat I've been promised? Five whole minutes?”

Jesper tossed the pillow aside to try and trap his lover in his arms. “You're underestimating me. I can accomplish a lot in five minutes, you know.”

“Get away from me, you absolute rascal!” Wylan laughed.

Swift like a squirrel, he untangled himself from Jesper's long limbs and escaped the bed before he could be caught.

“I might be a rascal, but you're still a thief. You've stolen my shirt again,” Jesper pointed out, grinning, propping himself up on one elbow, a delirious sort of joy bubbling up in his chest. “Why this shirt? There's a wardrobe full of them.” He gestured toward the large piece of furniture, which was standing in the corner of the room like an overzealous butler.

Wylan shrugged. “The ones in the closet don't have your scent.”

Jesper jumped out of bed, determined not to let his prey get away. “Come here, you lovely, lovely creature.” When Wylan tried to escape again, laughing, Jesper closed the distance between them in two strides and grabbed him by the hips from behind. This time, he was able to get his hands underneath the shirt, and let them roam the firm expanse of his lover's stomach. “I'm gonna have to take my shirt back at some point, you know,” he reminded Wylan in a whisper, kissing the spot where his jawline met his neck. He had spent enough time kissing him by now to know this specific spot elicited all sorts of delicious shivers. He wondered if there were others he didn't yet know about. He still had so much exploration to do.

Already, Wylan was leaning against Jesper’s taller frame and melting under his touch. The answer came out breathy and labored. “Go ahead.”

One by one, Jesper popped the buttons open, until he could open the shirt, revealing Wylan's naked body underneath. He was sporting the most beautiful and enticing morning wood, and by all the saints, Jesper was desperate to lavish pleasure upon it.

“I really don't want to go downstairs,” Wylan pouted, resting his head back against Jesper’s shoulder. “We could lock ourselves up in this room.”

“Tempting,” Jesper conceded, making the shirt slip off his lover’s shoulders, “but Kaz would be back soon enough, and I should remind you he's a master lock picker.”

“But you've put your tie on the doorknob! It’s supposed to deter him,” he protested, as if their boss was some sort of garden pest.

Jesper shook his head with a resigned sigh. “I know, but if there's a job and a lot of money on the table, he will drag us out of here by the scruff of our necks if he needs to, trust me.”

Despite having put his arms through the shirt’s sleeves, Jesper made no attempt to button it just yet. Instead, he made Wylan turn around to face him. Their erections brushed against one another and the intimate friction made them both moan in unison. Saints above! This was pure torture. He dragged Wylan into another heated kiss, tongue and lips working his mouth loose, slick and open.

Wylan emitted a sweet, muffled mewl, his nails digging little crescents into the small of Jesper’s back underneath the loose shirt. Jesper thought he was about to lose it with the need to push him into bed and ravish him on the spot.

They inched apart just enough so Wylan could say: “If you want me to get dressed and follow Kaz's orders, you're going to have to stop kissing me and let me go.”

“But you're so soft and warm and perfect,” Jesper whined, trying to catch an ultimate feeling of Wylan's skin by burying his face in the crook of his neck.

“I'm far from perfect, and you're making it very difficult for me too, you know.”

Jesper threw his head back: “Uuughh, I hate Kaz!!!” he shouted to the ceiling.

“I heard that,” a raspy voice groaned, from somewhere on the same floor. The walls were paper-thin.

“Good!” Jesper yelled in response.

“Hurry up!” Kaz scolded them again. The door of his room slammed shut, and the thud of his cane on the floor receded down the hallway.

With a look of apology, Jesper rubbed Wylan's naked back. “Don't worry, though. As soon as I can get you in a quiet corner, I'll have my wicked way with you.” He punctuated the new promise with a wink.

“Not if I can get you into that corner first.”

“Bold words, good sir…”

***

The Dreg’s club had already started undergoing some transformations under Kaz’s new management. Those changes were more visible now, in the light of day, than when Jesper had last crossed the barroom, at three bells in the morning.

Two of the tables in the far corner had been replaced with billiard ones and half of the windows were now draped in black curtains. The meager selection of cheap kerch jenever on the shelves had now been improved with the addition of a mouthwatering array of spirits from all around the True Sea; kaelish whisky, ravkan vodka, zemini rum, and even some rare brands of sake from Shu Han. New staff members buzzed like bees around the bar, the tables and the customers, and a busboy was busy polishing the brand new Makker's wheel.

The first person Jesper encountered downstairs was his boss, standing on the landing with his spine stiff like a tin soldier’s.

“I swear, this better be good, Kaz, or else…” Jesper grunted. He had renounced a morning of delights in the company of a rather stunning specimen for whatever that new job was. It had to be worth the sacrifice.

Kaz raised an eyebrow; the one over his bruised eye socket. Or else what? that look said.

But Jesper knew better than to threaten Kaz Brekker, even with empty threats. “This better be good,” he just repeated instead.

“I wouldn't have bothered if I didn't think it was.”

Kaz was staring across the room and Jesper followed his gaze. One of the new waitresses was bringing food to a table of three: Zoya, the fierce-looking squaller they had met during their previous trip to Ravka, along with a man Jesper had never seen before. Nina was sitting across from Zoya with a look of barely-veiled annoyance on her face.

“Where's Wylan?” Kaz asked.

“He’s still upstairs. I'm sure he'll be down shortly.”
Then, Jesper heaved a sigh. “I need a stiff drink,” he declared. It might still be a bit early for it, but he had to find a way to drown the grief of all the sex he was currently missing. He ordered three shots of zemini spice rum at the bar, and then leaned back against it to assess the newcomer.

The man sitting at Zoya's right-hand side had an open, amicable expression. He was a sturdy, rugged, warrior-type: with multiple piercings, long black hair tied at the back of his head, and strong arms left uncovered by his sleeveless jacket. Handsome? Definitely. But not Jesper's type. Could he be Wylan's type, though? Would Wylan find him attractive? The idea of him being seduced by the looks of another tugged at Jesper’s insides in a strange, disagreeable way. He downed his first rum shot as soon as the barman poured it. It wasn't jealousy, though. He had never been the jealous type.

Kaz joined him at the bar. “You should go get your boy. It's taking too long.”

“He's not my boy,” Jesper retorted, then made a head gesture toward the staircase. “Besides, he's coming down right now.”

“At last…. “ Kaz groaned when Wylan finally joined them, carrying his vest and coat draped over his forearm.

I'm sorry. I had to iron that shirt.” He smoothed the blue gingham fabric over his chest. “This is supposed to be a business meeting, no? I had to be presentable.”

“How very Kerch of you,” Jesper teased him.

With that shirt, plus leather suspenders found in the wardrobe of Jesper's new room, Wylan looked so dainty and proper, like the adult version of an eager schoolboy. It was a tiny bit distracting. Nothing Jesper couldn't handle, though.

Armed with his two last shots of rum, Jesper walked over to the table of negotiations and sat directly on top of it, like some sort of lazy, ship's figurehead, purring a seductive “hello ladies.'' His very unkerch manners earned him a disapproving look from both Kaz and Wylan, and his flirty greeting a vaguely distrusting one from Zoya. His charms had no chance to work on her, and he knew how to recognize a losing battle when he saw one.

“This is Jesper, my sharpshooter, this is Nina, our heartrender, and this is Wylan, my demolition man,” Kaz introduced them all, as he sat down on the fourth chair. “My crows.”

From the corner of his eyes, Jesper spied Wylan puffing his chest up ever so slightly, and he bit back a smile.

“I’m Zoya Nazyalensky, squaller of the Second Army,” she introduced herself, mostly to Wylan’s benefit. “This is Tolya Yul-Bataar.”

“And here is the official royal request,” Tolya completed, handing a sealed document to Kaz.

Kaz broke the seal and skimmed through the first few lines. “So you want us to find something called… the Neshyenyer.”

That name tore an incredulous scoff out of Nina. “The Neshyenyer?! Santa Neyar's blade?”

“Seems like you haven't forgotten everything you were taught at the Little Palace,” Zoya sneered, “just your loyalty to Ravka.”

“Ravka or Kirigan?” Nina snapped. “It didn't need him destroying a city for me to question my loyalty.”

Jesper exchanged a look with Wylan. Would they witness some sort of cat fight? In any case, his money was on Nina.

“So, now that we know you two have history,” Jesper said, bringing the conversation back to what really mattered. “What’s the payment for that particular job?

“Name your price,” Tolya stated, between two bites of sweet bread. “It matters that much.”

Oh. Unlimited funds? Now he had Jesper's full interest.

The document had passed from Kaz's hands to Nina's, and Wylan peeked at it over her shoulder. “Is that the Lantsov family crest?”

“You know it is,” Nina jeered, aiming a glower at Zoya across the table, “because it's hideous.”

A waitress came by to refill Tolya's mug and he thanked her with a sort of smile Jesper could easily recognize, since he had used the same as a means of seduction more than his fair share. If Tolya was interested in women, maybe he wouldn't be a rival for Wylan's attention, afterall. Unless, like Jesper, he was powered by both sail and steam….

“Prince Nikolai requests your service to retrieve the blade and deliver it to Alina Starkov, in East Ravka,” Tolya said, once the waitress had gone on her merry way.

“She's returned?” Nina exclaimed.

Of course she had. Jesper knew it would take more than a pirate like Sturmhond to stop or defeat Alina. She was a tough one.

“As so has the Darkling, with an indestructible army of shadow monsters,” Zoya informed them.

Volcras, and now shadow monsters? Jesper gritted his teeth. “I don't like the sound of that.” He took a sip of rum to swallow that bitter pill. Of course, a job with unlimited funds was not going to be a walk in the park.

“She needs the blade to kill them,” Zoya stated. “It's the only thing that might work.”

“Retrieve the blade, and the prince will pay you whatever you want,” Tolya reiterated, no doubt hoping the promise of riches beyond their wildest dreams would sway those greedy crows.

“But I do like the sound of that!” Jesper replied, very much swayed, and he toasted to his own weakness and emptied his shot glass.

“I assume the same goes for you?” Zoya asked, turning toward Kaz. He hadn't said much so far.

He smirked, which must have been painful, given the state of his split lip. “I welcome the chance to help your prince spend his country's money.”

“I don't need Kruge,” Nina pressed them. “I need to get someone out of Hellgate. The Lantsov; they must be able to pull strings with the Kerch government?!”

A mocking grin spread on Zoya's face, and Jesper couldn't help but think it made her even more terrifying. “For a certain Fjerdan?”

Nina swallowed. Her silence spoke volumes.

Jesper glanced back at Wylan. They had had a lucky escape from the law the night before. How would he feel, right now, if Wylan was in jail like Nina’s man, instead of standing less than a step away from him, at reassuring arm's length ? Jesper had this sudden and rather absurd need to hook a finger behind one of those stupid leather suspenders and pull, so Wylan would be even closer.

“He must be quite the slab of fur!” Zoya said, not done taunting Nina.

Tolya was the one who put an end to the bickering. “The offer is the offer, and Prince Nikolai is a man of his words.

“But we need to go now,” Zoya added, getting back on track.

Nina, Wylan and Jesper turned their eyes to Kaz, their leader. He was the one calling the shots. He slipped the royal request into his coat's inner pocket. “It's settled. We're in.”

Jesper knocked two times on the table for good luck, a flutter of excitement rising in the pit of his stomach at the idea of going on a new adventure; with fortune at the key…. and thrill…and Wylan. There was just one component missing for perfect happiness.

As if reading his mind, Zoya cleared her throat. “What about your Wraith?” she asked Kaz. “I was expecting to see her.”

“She's gone.”

Jesper shook his head. “No, she's not, not yet, she's–”

“Not an option!” Kaz cut him off, with the kind of glare that made the bravest of criminals scurry away in fear and dread.

Jesper shut his mouth, his eyes throwing daggers which might well have been Inej's. She wouldn't be happy when she’d hear how Kaz dismissed her like that.

“I've some contacts who fancy themselves as art thieves,” Kaz told Zoya, pushing himself up on his feet with the help of his cane. “They might be able to give me some information regarding the blade’s whereabouts. And while I'm out, I'm going to pick up a couple fake passports for my crew. I should be back in less than a bell.”

Jesper didn't even wait for Kaz to cross the threshold and disappear in the street to head toward the staircase. Wylan caught up on him. “Where are you going?”

“Kaz doesn't want Inej to know we're doing a job for the sun summoner,” he said, as way of of explanation.

“So you’re going to go and tell her right away…”

“Precisely.” He gave Wylan a smile. “I'm impressed, Sunshine. You’re really starting to figure me out.”

Wylan shrugged. “I've no merit.You’re quite the contrarian.”

Nina appeared at Wylan's side. “You're going to see Inej? I'll come with you. I promised I'd help her get rid of that ugly Menagerie tattoo.”

“Good idea,” Jesper concurred.

“Do you guys need me for anything?” Wylan offered.

One of the waitresses was coming out of the kitchen with a basket filled with golden rolls of sweetbread. Jesper's stomach growled, but he could wait. “I don't think so. You should stay here, though, and get yourself some breakfast while you can, darling.” Afterall, they had a long journey ahead, and Wylan had to build some strength for it.

“Darling, huh?” Nina teased, once they were out of earshot, nudging Jesper with her elbow as they climbed the stairs side by side.

Jesper snorted. “I call everyone darling, darling.”

She gave him a sidelong look. “Yeah, keep telling yourself that.”

Those damn heartrenders, always picking up on things…

***

Jesper jumped on his feet. “Wait a minute… Is that my hat!?”

Indignant, he marched across the bedroom to get his hands on the evidence of Inej’s theft. She must have found it while rummaging through the rubbles of the old Crow Club. What was it with people stealing his clothes these days; Wylan with his shirts and now Inej with his top hats? Soon he'd have to go around the streets naked, and the Barrel wasn't yet prepared to handle that life-changing sight.

“You hate that hat,” Inej pointed out. She had more acute concerns than Jesper's missing pieces of clothing. “Why wouldn't Kaz tell me about a job for the Sun Summoner?”

“Because he'd rather push you away than admit he feels anything for you.”

A startled silence fell on Inej’s bedroom. She and Jesper stared at Nina with a matching look of astonishment, and no small amount of glee, at least in Jesper’s case.

“Sorry,” Nina apologized, when she took in their expression, her hand hovering over Inej's wrist. “I wasn't supposed to say that out loud?”

“I, for one, love that you did,” Jesper said. He sat down on the travel trunk close to the vanity and placed the hat upon his head, tilting it just right. He struck a pose to look at himself in the mirror. There was something wrong with it, definitely. Was it the fit? The color? The pattern? The width of the brim? The type of felt? It surely couldn't be his own face. There had never been anything wrong with it. “Yeah, I hate that hat,” he declared, tossing it away. He turned his attention to Inej, who was still sporting the same troubled look ever since he had repeated Kaz's dismissive, uncompromising words. Now, Jesper would do anything to erase that expression from her face; turn it into a smile. “Listen. I don't know what happened between you two,” he began, “cause no one in this bloody band of broken dolls can confab worth a damn, but I know Kaz, and I know you, and I thought you'd at least like to know why we're doing this; for your saint.”

And then it worked. A sliver of a smile illuminated her features for an instant, and Jesper returned it in kind.

By then, Nina had done all she could to remove the ink from under Inej's epidermis and make it disappear into her bloodstream. The ugly, black peacock feather now looked like a vague, pale scar with an innocuous herringbones shape. “It's the best I can do, dear,” Nina said gently. “Once again, I'm not a tailor, but I hope it helps anyway.”

“It does, very much so. Thank you Nina,” Inej replied, grateful. When she stood, a weight seemed to have been lifted off of her shoulders

Nina excused herself, something about sweetbread and pancakes, but Jesper wasn't listening. He was still looking at his image in the mirror. Did he need a haircut? Would Wylan like his hair shorter? Why was he even worrying about Wylan's tastes in haircuts anyway?

“So?” Inej said, once Nina was gone and that she'd close the door behind her. “We're a bunch of rag dolls who don't know how to confide in each other, huh?

“I said ‘a bloody band of broken dolls’,” Jesper corrected, “but yeah. Pretty much.”

She let herself fall onto the chair by the vanity. “It's true, though, isn't it?

He nodded. “I'm afraid it is.”

She wrung her hands in her lap. “I can tell you what happened between Kaz and I, since you asked...”

“You don't have to tell me anything, you know,” he reassured her, “unless you want to.”

“I want to.” She took a deep breath. “The night of the scheme against Pekka, I wasn't there at the Emerald Palace even though Kaz wanted me to be. I said I would be there, with him, but…” She casted her eyes down. “He asked me to spread Wylan's compound on that ship moored at Fifth Harbor, the Drakanasha, and while I was on board, I heard cries. It was a slavers’ ship.They had people trapped there. They were trafficking those poor women, Jes.” She looked up at him, her eyes gleaming with unshed tears. “One of the women had just delivered a baby. They would have sold her anyway, to one of the brothels; and taken her baby from her, probably sold it too… They would've forced her to take clients even though she wasn't yet healed from giving birth. I know how it goes. I’ve seen it before. I couldn't… I had too-” Her voice broke, but she didn't cry. Inej never cried. Jesper offered his hands and she took them. He could feel her pain through that simple touch.

“Oh, honey,” he breathed. “It's okay. It's alright.” He rubbed his thumbs along hers. “You did the right thing. You always do the right thing.”

“But now he's mad at me for it.”

“Nah. He knows you did good. He's just sore and insecure and afraid, like the rest of us. He's as much a broken doll as we all are, maybe even worse.” He moved his thumbs to trace soothing circles over the inside of her wrists. “I'm not saying that to excuse his poor behavior. I'm just saying you shouldn't feel bad for following your heart and your instincts.”

She closed her eyes, breathed in and out, slowly, and nodded. “You’re right.”

When she opened her eyes again, there was a smile in them, and it was sincere. He had no idea how she did that, and had always marveled at her capacity for resilience. “What about you? How are you doing, Jes? I feel like we've barely spoken a word to each other since we got off that ship from Ravka. Everything's just been so crazy. How are things for you? How are things with–”

He chuckled. “You want to ask about Wylan, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

He let go of her hands, feeling a sudden and overwhelming urge to move. “Saints! Where to begin?” He started by doing a lap around the travel trunk he'd been using as a seat. “He's very sweet; definitely sweeter than I deserve. And at the same time, he’s such a firecracker, I swear!”

“Fitting, for a demolition's man,” she laughed gently.

“Doesn't it just?” He ran a hand through his hair, still pacing around the room. “He surprises me, like, all the time; keeps me on my toes. He's sophisticated too. I thought I was the only sophisticated person in the Barrel. And he's so smart, Nej! Probably even smarter than he lets on. I feel like spending time with him makes me smarter too, by osmosis or something.” He stopped in his tracks. “See? I've even used the word ‘osmosis’!”

“I like seeing you like this,” she commented, with a fond and tender tinge to her voice. “It suits you. You're glowing.”

Jesper felt a surge of heat reach his cheekbones. He didn't blush, of course. That was more Wylan's thing. “You're clearly exaggerating.” He walked around the trunk another time before he admitted: “It does feel good, though, you're right. But, at the same time, I'm terrified of messing it up. I mess things up all the time. And usually, I don't really care, but, this; this is different…” He leaned down to pick up the hat he had tossed on the floor in a cavalier gesture a few minutes earlier. Carefully, he placed it on Inej's vanity.

She stood from her chair and touched his forearms, guiding him around to face her. “Just be your wonderful self, and be a good friend to him, first and foremost,” she advised, “just like you are to me. The rest will settle around that core once it’s solid enough.”

“You think so?”

“I do.”

“Hm. I love you so much, you,” he whispered with a smile.

She smiled back. “I love you too, Jes.”

Jesper opened his arms, allowing her to decide if she wanted that hug. She stepped forward and squeezed him around the chest. He closed his embrace around her tiny frame ; even tinier than Wylan's somehow.

He had missed her. It felt so nice to have her close to him again.

As the hug lingered, he rested his cheek over her fragrant hair. It smelled like nutmeg and expensive incense. “And don't worry about Kaz. He'll come around. He cares about you; he's just being an idiot right now. He's clever, most of the time, but when it comes to you, he gets very stupid very quickly.”

She chuckled. “Perhaps we should lock him up with Wylan, and wait for the osmosis to operate. How long do you think it would take?”

Jesper sucked on his teeth. “Wylan's smartness is potent, but on the other hand, Kaz has the emotional intelligence of a clam, so your guess is as good as mine. Besides, I don't think Wy would forgive me if I ever did that to him.”

She stepped back to look at him. “And we want you to stay in his good graces.”

“Precisely.” He extended an arm toward the door. “Shall we go downstairs, and see if Mr. Clam Brekker can be reasoned with?”

She heaved another sigh, casting her eyes heavenward, probably asking all her saints to give her strength. “We can always try.”

***

Even before they reached the bottom of the stairs, Jesper already knew that Kaz had spotted them together, and that he wasn't happy about it.

He walked up to them, with a hard frown on his face. To the untrained eyes, it looked no different than his normal expression, but Jesper could tell he was upset.

“I see you couldn't help yourself….Jes,” he spat, handing him a counterfeit passport in a terse gesture. He never used Jesper's nickname, unless in a sarcastic manner. This, right now, was a demonstration of petty jealousy Jesper would not even bother to comment.

Jesper took the passport and went to the bar, ordering another rum shot, but staying within hearing distance so Inej knew he was there for moral support should she need it.

“You have your freedom,” Kaz reminded her, “why would this be what you choose to do with it?”

She held his glaring stare. “I'm not here for you. I'm here for Sankta Alina.”

Kaz’s reply came out even harsher. “So much for ‘what happens to saints is fate.’ ”

Inej had said those words to Kaz a few days earlier, in support of him, to let him know that she prioritized him and the Crows over leaving to help Alina. And now he was throwing it right back in her face.

Jesper rolled his eyes so hard they may have made a complete circle in their sockets. Kaz Brekker had absolutely no game whatsoever. Jesper might have to offer some tutoring, before Kaz made an even bigger embarrassment of himself.

“I'll secure my own passport,” Inej hissed, before she walked away.

Jesper took a quick look at his new passport, wondering who was the poor sod, probably long dead, whose identity he was going to steal for the next few days. The name was a generic, zemini-kerch one; nothing remarkable. The age, on the other hand; Thirty six!? What on earth?? He was over a decade younger than that!

Wylan was standing some tables away, studying the content of his satchel, most likely taking a tally of his chemical supplies for the mission.

Jesper went to him, in need of someone to vent to. “How have I wronged him?”

“Hm?” Wylan asked, distractedly.

“The passport!” Jesped clarified, waving the piece of paper. “He made me even older than last time!”

“Technically you are older than last time,” Wylan deadpanned, with the barest hint of a smile.

Jesper pulled a face. That Grey Imp and his smart mouth would be his undoing one day.

He peered at Wylan's own passport, on the table in front of him, or rather, at the stolen identity of one Cletus Phrebeny, 16 years old, from Saint-Hilde. “Oh Saints! That's a terrible name.”

Wylan threw a nervous look around the room, then leaned toward Jesper and whispered, like a confession : “Wh-what does it say?”; as if he couldn't read the eight words in front of his eyes and needed Jesper to say them out loud for him.

“Why, can't you read it?” Jesper asked with an insolent snigger; a little payback for Wylan's jab about his age. He regretted immediately upon seeing the sheer panic that took over Wylan’s entire expression. He was shooting frantic glances around, looking for a way out, like a distressed, broken-winged starling struggling inside a net.

The meaning of this struck Jesper at once and his throat constricted. Wylan had no idea what was written on his passport ; couldn't decipher the letters. Savvy, smart, nifty Wylan Hendriks couldn’t read. How was that even possible? “Ah. Hm.” Say something, Jesper. Anything. Just SAY SOMETHING. “I mean, I can barely read it myself.”

Wylan shrunk in on himself, wilting like a flower in scorching, dry heat. “I should go pack,” he blurted out. He grabbed his passport and turned, no doubt to hide his hurt, grabbed his satchel from the corner of the table and hurried toward the staircase without a look back, leaving Jesper to contemplate the depth of his mistake.

Jesper crumbled down over the table. You're a fucking idiot, Jesper Fahey. An imbecile. An irrecuperable moron.

His smooth charms would not be of any help to get out of this one.

Wylan must have kept that secret close to his chest ever since they first met. Him being illiterate explained certain things; like his reaction when Jesper handed him the menu at the Blue Paradise the night before: how’d been struck with fright at the mere sight of it. But, so much had happened since the previous night. They had gotten even closer, and just now, Wylan finally mustered the courage to be vulnerable, and ask Jesper for help, because now he trusted him enough to do it, and Jesper just humiliated him and turned his struggle to derision.

Inej had just sat down to eat alone at one of the tables by the windows. Jesper rushed there and dropped on the chair across from her, hiding his face in his hands. “Inej,” he lamented. “I think I fucked up… No. I know I fucked up.

She swallowed her sip of water and put her glass down. “What is it? What happened?

He parted his fingers to peek at her from in-between. “I've pulled an Arken's train again.”

“An Arken's train? What does that mean?”

“Things were going well. Things were on tracks - tracks that actually connected, we were heading in the right direction, but then I was careless," he rambled, fidgeting with his rings, “and I went and gambled away the fuel, so to speak, and now I think I just made the whole thing derail, and I couldn't stop my stupid mouth, and-”

“I'm sure this is a brilliant metaphor,” she interrupted, before he could spiral down any further, “but I'm not following you. You're gonna have to be more specific.”

“I told you I'd mess things up with Wylan. It was only a matter of time! How could I have not seen it before? How could I have not realized what was going on?!”

“Calm down, Jes. Breathe.” She put her hand over his forearm, hoping it would help ground him somehow. “Tell me what happened. I'm sure we can fix it.”

***

Jesper lay his head and ear over the bedroom door. No sound came from the other side. No breathing, no footsteps. Nothing. Maybe Wylan was curled up in bed. Jesper prayed to all the living saints that he wasn't crying.

Had Wylan locked the door? Jesper couldn't tell. He hadn't tried the doorknob yet. If Wylan had, in fact, locked it, Jesper could use his powers to unlock it from outside, but that would be a breach of privacy he wasn't ready to commit, unless he had no other choice.

He knocked his garnet ring three times on the door, gently. “Wylan? Can we talk?”

No answer.

He waited a little, hoping to hear the ruffling of clothes, the muffled sounds of bare feet on the old, creaking floor. Anything, really. He took a deep breath and knocked again, a tad louder. “Could you please open the door? I just want to speak with you.”

Once again, the question was met with silence. Silences; they truly weren't his favorite thing, and this kind was the absolute worst.

“Wy? Are you there?” he tried for the third time.

Still nothing.

This time, Jesper closed his fingers on the doorknob and let his small science travel through the mechanism. It hadn't been locked. Slow and reluctant, he turned and pushed. The door creaked open, revealing a cold, drafty and empty room.

The leather satchel was gone, so were the clothes Wylan had been wearing the day before, with the notable exception of the silk neckerchief. It was neatly folded on the vanity, the silver pin placed on top. Besides it, he found Wylan’s counterfeit passport. Jesper had this sudden urge to rip it to shreds, as if everything that just happened was the fault of that piece of paper. Instead, he left it there, exactly where he had found it, like this was some sort of crime scene. He didn't dare touch it - or the neckerchief, just in case. In case of what? He wasn't sure.

The daft was coming in from the window, which had been left wide open, its brown curtains flapping like the flag on a distressed vessel. Jesper noticed that, outside, the fire escape ladder was pulled down all the way to the ground. Once he had latched the window shut, Jesper stepped back until the edge of the bed mattress met with the back of his knees and he sat, a familiar lump in his throat.

Different house. Different bedroom. And yet, the same sentiment.
His lover had fled; abandoned him without a word.

***

Not a single wrinkle disturbed the smooth plain of the bedspread – the pillows were two perfect rectangles, placed on top of it in a parallel line. In fact, the bed was so neatly made it looked like no one had ever slept in it. Then again, Inej had never seen Kaz sleep.

He was sitting at his desk, looking out the window when she came in. Since she made no attempt at a quiet approach, he noticed her presence right away and swiveled on his chair. His eyes fell on her rolled up sleeves, specifically her left wrist. “I see Nina managed to erase your tattoo,”

“Yes. It’s gone.” She brought her hand there, rubbing the scar with her thumb, as if she could erase the last traces of it herself.

“Good.” He took his cane, but remained seated and rested his hands atop the crow's head as he studied her. “What can I do for you? If you're having trouble with the passport, I can still get you one; it’s you who insisted on managing on your own.”

She shook her head, making her long brain swing between her shoulder blades. “I'm not here about the passport…” She hesitated. Was telling Kaz about this truly the best option? “I'm here about Wylan. I think Jesper might have upsetted him pretty badly.”

“That was to be expected. I told you the honeymoon wouldn't last. We know Jesper and his tendency to shoot from the hip. But why are you telling me this? I've other things to do than mediating a lovers’ spat.”

She rubbed her hands together. The room wasn't exactly cold, but her fingertips were freezing all of a sudden. “He’s just escaped out the window from Jesper’s room. He’s headed for the Rozenstraat workshop, but I'm not sure he's going to stay there. I think he might make a run for it. We could lose him in the city.”

“I see.” Kaz’s own, gloved fingers took a firmer grip on the pommel of his cane. “We can't let that happen. I can't afford it at this stage. And we're supposed to leave the country in two hours.” He stared at her, blue eyes focused, like a leopard on the prowl. She already knew what he was going to ask her. Perhaps, she had known even before she stepped in the room. “You can never please a wolf and a lamb at the same time”, said the suli proverb. It was indeed tricky, to try and juggle conflicting loyalties. “You have to catch up to him,” he told her. “You have to convince him to come with us to Shu Han. He can't stay on his own in Ketterdam. His father could find him before we get to negotiate anything”.

She clenched her teeth. “I don't like that meddling. I just came here to inform you. I don't want to be your instrument of manipulation to ensure that Wylan does your bidding.”

This time, Kaz pulled himself up on his feet. “And yet I'm asking you to. I trust you will find the right words.”

“Jesper’s heart hangs in the balance,” she protested. “I don't want to gamble with it.”

Kaz remained silent, not like someone who’s pondering and measuring her argument, and could change his mind. No. It was more like he was waiting for her to empty all of her concerns before he could ignore them and draw the final orders.

“Jesper might not acknowledge it yet, but I think he's in love with Wylan,” she still revealed. “You –us– getting involved behind his back ; it could hurt him, Kaz.”

As expected the argument had no grip on him. “This is the Barrel. It's the survival of the fittest. There’s no place for sentiment here.”

“Of course there's not,” she hissed in resentment. “Why would there be?” For all his cleverness and intelligent scheming, he had a great deal of trouble seeing what was right in front of him. Jesper’s words came back to her mind: “he gets stupid when it comes to you.”

“We don't have a choice, Inej. Besides, Wylan’s chances of survival are slim if he’s out there on his own. The city’s just waiting to devour him. You know it as well as I do, or else you wouldn't be here.”

He was right. She worried about Wylan. She had seen how he lived before Kaz brought him under the Crows’ protection. Nobody deserved to be left in squalid poverty, alone, scared and hungry. With his angelic, youthful features, it was a miracle that Wylan hadn't fallen prey to the illegal sex trade already. “I still don't like that,” she stated, holding his gaze.

“Noted.”

“This is the last time you’re asking me to get involved in this. The next time you do, I’m telling them both everything.”

He had the audacity to snigger at that. “You're as involved in this as I am – you've been from the start. You wouldn't take the risk of falling even a notch in our dear Jes’ esteem.”

Kaz never used Jesper's nickname, not seriously. This was just a ploy to sway her. She threw a humorless laugh right back at him. “You think I wouldn't tell him? Then think again.”

“Inej!” he called after her, as she reached the door. She ignored him and left the room, but her heart was drumming in her chest. Everytime he said her name, it was as if she was hearing it for the first time; as if she was baptized into this world with it all over again. Right this moment, she hated that sensation.

She wanted to throttle Kaz, and he'd deserve it. But she also knew that if he was to disappear from her life, there would be a cold space left in his place. He'd still walk uninvited into her thoughts; still lurk in the corners of her mind. Most of the time, though, he'd be standing at the very center of it, demanding to be seen and heard, and she'd let him. She'd let herself be haunted.

Also, her tattoo might be gone, but one fact remained; if Kaz hadn't come along, maybe she'd still be in the Menagerie. Whether she liked it or not, he had been her initial savior, and the one who had unlocked in her the power to then save herself, over and over again. She didn't need Kaz anymore, but he still needed her, and maybe, that was the reason why she was so reluctant to just seize her freedom and run with it.

Outside, on the street, it had started raining.

Chapter Text

Wylan sunk his cock into the warm body, maybe a little rougher than he should have. He got an animalistic grunt of approval from the boy bent over the writing desk in front of him, so he did it again. He didn't even know his first name, not that it mattered anyway. The university student was a mere two years older than Wylan, but he still came with the arrogant attitude and the intellectual superiority of someone who knew he’d been hired by the richest man in Ketterdam to teach his feeble-minded son how to read and write. Wylan didn't especially like him, or found him that attractive. Those trysts were never about that – had never been about that. It was all about power, and avoidance.

The tutors, at first, always tried to be the ones bending Wylan over the furniture, because they liked the idea of getting one over their boss by debauching, submitting and possessing his only son and heir. Wylan wouldn't let them, though. In fact, he had never let anyone penetrate him. Not giving those men what they truly wanted was his way of clinging to his last shred of self-respect.

There had always been another motivation in seducing his tutors though ; while he was keeping them busy, they weren't trying to make him read or write. If he distracted them long enough, the hour would pass without him even having to open a book.

The tutor grunted again, and Wylan took it as a cue to accelerate his thrusts.

Despite their rather compromising position, Wylan had left the door ajar. This, too, had a specific purpose.

He could hear the footsteps coming down the hallway, on the polished hardwood floor. He could recognize those footsteps anywhere. They had the characteristic, unhurried yet stiff pace of someone sure of their own importance; someone who would never wait for anyone, but always expected others to wait for him.

Through the door's opening, Wylan met Jan Van Eck's eyes.

For Wylan, this was a sophisticated form of self-harm, because he expected to get a serious beating out of this, to be yelled at, and for his tutor to be thrown out of the mansion. This time, though, his father's face betrayed absolutely nothing. The trick had gotten old, apparently. Jan looked at his half-naked son, engaged in intercourse in the study room, the same way one would look at two flies mating on a windowsill. He didn't even care enough anymore to be angry, or even disgusted. He simply didn't care.

The eye contact only lasted for a split second, and Jan was gone again. Wylan instantly lost his erection. He stepped back, his hands trembling, and he pulled his trousers and underwear up from around his ankles to cover himself.

“Wh-what's going on?” the other boy complained. He obviously hadn't noticed his employer’s brief appearance in the doorframe.

“Nothing. I'm done.”

“I haven't come yet,” he pointed out.

Wylan tucked his shirt back into his trousers and buttoned his suspenders. “Well, I can't go on, so you should get dressed.”

With a scoff, the tutor collected his clothes from the floor and put them back on with brisk, frustrated gestures.

Wylan let himself fall onto the nearest chair. He wasn't even embarrassed of leaving the other boy high and dry. He was just numb. The very last sliver of attention his father spared for Wylan ; the very last thread that linked them as a family had been Jan's deep seeded anger toward his son : his hatred. And now Wylan didn't even have that anymore.

“Tell your prick of a father I'm quitting,” the tutor growled, pocketing his cravat instead of taking the time to tie it back around his neck. “You're shit at all of this,” he added, gesturing to the pile of books and writing paper scattered on the desk. “You're a lost cause, Van Eck… and you're not even a good fuck.”

“Get out,” Wylan said, his voice even.

“With pleasure.”

The tutor slammed the door on his way out.

The second he was gone, Wylan was seized with a shiver and he burst into tears; hot, burning tears of despair, anger and humiliation. In all honesty, they took him by surprise. He was convinced he couldn't feel anything anymore.

Two weeks later, his father announced he was sending him to boarding school in Belendt. The day after that, he ended up swimming for his life in the Geldcanal, traces of strangulation on his neck, his tears mixing with the filthy, polluted water on his face.

Five months later, he was crying again. The salt of his tears was now diluted by the rainwater dripping from his hair as he tried to undo the padlocks on the workshop’s door. He wiped his eyes with his sleeve, but it didn't help. His hands were trembling, his vision was blurry and his throat so tight it was like being strangled all over again. The last padlock gave, and he stumbled into the building, his wobbly legs barely supporting the weight of his own anguish.

“I say : good riddance.”

“You're a lost cause. And you're not even a good fuck.”

“Why? Can't you read it?”

“WHY CAN'T YOU READ IT, WYLAN? IT'S NOT DIFFICULT!“

“You're only getting what you deserve.”

“FOCUS, YOU MORONIC WASTE OF SPACE!”

Wylan collapsed onto his bed, not caring that his coat was drenched in water. He curled up in a ball, like the pathetic child he was.

“Are you retarded, Van Eck?”

“Come on! Even a child can write that!”

“Shouldn't you be graduating university, and, I don't know, starting a desk job?”

“You're a lost cause.”

“Good riddance.”

“A dimwit; just like your mother.”

“Why? Can't you read it?”

He pleaded for a cease-fire with the voices in his mind, but knew it would not be so easy. Jesper's voice was the one that hurt the most, because it was the freshest wound - the one that was still bleeding.

“Why? Can't you read it?”

“WHY CAN'T YOU READ IT, WYLAN?”

Jesper's cruel scoff kept morphing into his father's voice, roaring like a beast from a nightmare, and then, he could hear the sound of him removing his belt to hit Wylan with the leather… or sometimes the buckle, when he was especially angry.

Wylan was sobbing now, face buried into the pillow, uncontrollable tremors going through his arms and fingers, making him grasp at the bed linens. “Snap out of it, Wylan! “ he urged himself. “Snap out of it!”

“I'm an adult, Jesper. I can manage my own feelings.” What an idiotic thing to say. Of course he couldn't. He never had been able to. Why would it be different now?

In reality, it had only been five days since Jesper came into the workshop asking "Is anyone here?”

It had been only three days since Jesper was lying on top of him on the hard cobblestone of Bietstraat, in the midst of a shootout, and realized he had slept with Wylan before.

It had only been thirty-four hours since Wylan had kissed Jesper with everything he had, and brought him to bed.

With a whimper, Wylan crawled out of that very same bed, and went to the kitchen area, staggering on his feet like a drunkard, to splashed water on his face over the stained, copper sink. The mirror offered a pitiful reflection; something that could barely count as a man; a dirty face marred with tears; with puffy eyes and trembling lips.

What was he expecting? That Jesper would fall in love with him? Wylan wanted to laugh at the absurdity of this belief. Only a few hours in Jesper's arms was all it took for him to start building sandcastles for the two of them, dreading the tide, but hoping it would never come, or not come so fast. Another childish thing, really.

Jesper, he realized, could potentially hurt him just as much as his father had; maybe not physically, but emotionally for sure, because Wylan cared about what Jesper thought of him. He cared about getting his attention and his affection, just like he had tried to earn his father’s respect and love, to no avail.

Wylan had had trouble breathing on his way back from the Slat, and had undone the first few buttons of his shirt to free his throat. Jesper's love bites were on full display now. Back when Prior had tried to strangle him, Wylan wished he could have washed away the marks. But these marks? Jesper's marks? Did he want them to disappear? No. He didn't want them to heal. Not yet anyways. This was yet another sophisticated form of self-harm. He'd hold on to the memory of Jesper's passion, no matter how much it hurt ; because it had been good, so very good, for the time it lasted.

Wylan had always used sex as a means to an end ; as a weapon to survive. Jesper had taught him that it could be something else ; something better – something tender ; shared, exchanged and enjoyed. In principle, he knew this was what intimacy was supposed to be like, but nobody had ever made him feel it, not before Jesper bursted into his life with his loud presence, his ridiculous outfits and his tilted top hats. Wylan had seen the sun for the first time, and retreating back into the shadows was an unbearable fate to contemplate.

No matter the tales he would spin for his own benefit, however, one fact remained; he was damaged goods. He would always be a child, and an inadequate one at that. He would never grow up to be the man Jesper would want, and deserved. Even in the unlikely scenario that Jesper still wished to pursue something with him, Wylan wasn't sure if he could. He was too ashamed, too humiliated and scared; way too scarred.

More tears run down his cheeks, making their way through the greasy soot that somehow got on his face from his race through the streets, and he decided this would be the last ones he'd shed on this.

He took his leather satchel from the floor and dropped it on the bed, placed his flute in it, along with chemical supplies he thought could get him out of a jam. He pulled from underneath the bed an old, battered suitcase that must have belonged to the last occupant of the workshop, and tossed clothes inside, along with a warm blanket and a pillow.

Where would he go? Away from Ketterdam –away from the threat of his father– away from heartache. Maybe to Saint-Hilde, where his mother was buried, to say goodbye properly, and beg the ghosts for a closure of some sort. Then, he could leave the country. He still had the kruge Kaz gave him– plenty enough to buy a passage on a ship to the Southern Colonies. And then, who knew? Maybe he'd find work as a farm hand on the numerous plantations there. If only he had kept the fake passport – he could have started a new life as… whatever his new hideous name was.

“Wylan?”

He jumped and bile rose in his throat when a voice spoke up from behind him. He hadn't heard Inej enter the workshop, but who could hear a wraith?

She came down the stairs, slow and careful, as if approaching some sort of wounded animal.

If she was here, Kaz must have sent her. Or maybe Jesper? No. Jesper would've come himself…but he wasn't there. “What are you doing here?” Wylan snarled, like the wounded creature he was, stuffing another blanket into the suitcase.

She gave him a rueful smile. “What about you?”

“I'm packing.”

“Not to go to Shu Han, I presume?”

He clasped the suitcase shut. “You haven't answered my question. Why are you here, Inej?”

She walked up to him and sat down on the edge of the bed, next to his satchel. “I'm here to prevent you from breaking my best friend's heart,” she said softly, a motherly sort of worry in her dark eyes.

“Breaking his heart?” Wylan scoffed. “I doubt it. I'm just a passing dalliance; nothing more. He'll find someone else in no time. It's not like he's lacking in charm.”

“I doubt he’ll move on as easily as you think.”

“How would you know anyway!? You've seen us together only a handful of times!” It came out harsher than he intended. If anyone was deserving of anger right now, it was himself, not her.

“It’s true that I don't know you very well,” she conceded, “but I know Jesper. He can be careless with his words sometimes, but he didn't mean to hurt you. Underneath his easy-going, devil-may-care attitude, there's someone who cares….a lot. And I can tell he cares about you.”

With a vigorous shake of his head, Wylan brought the suitcase to the stairs, dropping it on the first step. “I don't want to know that. I don't want to hear those words, Inej.” He balled his hands into fists. “Jesper told you what happened, didn't he? He told you everything?”

She gave no verbal confirmation, but he didn't need one. And if Inej was aware of his handicap, that meant Kaz had been informed as well. It was only a matter of time before he'd get fired as the Crows' demo man.

“Jesper’s not perfect either, you know,” she pointed out. “ He has his own secrets; his own shame.”

Wylan's shoulders dropped. He sighed and sat down onto the stairs. He wanted to sleep for a year. “Like the Durast thing?”

“Like the Durast thing.”

“Does he know that you know?”

She shook her head.

“He's not as subtle about it as he thinks he is,” Wylan pointed out with a humorless chuckle.
“But if being a grisha is his secret flaw, though, in my book, it just makes him more perfect, so your point is moot.”

She pulled a face. “You've yet to learn many things about Jesper Fahey.”

“Maybe, but I won't be there to learn them.”

“Don't you think it's a bit of a rash decision, to leave without even hearing what he has to say about it? “

The nasty taste of bile was back on Wylan’s tongue. “It wouldn't change anything,” he stated, his voice threatening to break. “I don't know how to read, Inej. I'm useless. Jesper went to university and I'm barely able to spell my own name.”

“Nobody cares about that here. Jesper doesn't care,” she assured him.

“Well, I care! You've no idea how many times it destroyed my life!” The taste in his mouth had turned from bitter to sour - venom from an anger that could never find a proper outlet. “You’ve no idea how that feels ; to have your life destroyed again and again, even when you think there's nothing left of it!” He felt new tears burning the corner of his eyes, and he dug his fingernails into the palms of his hands. He would not cry. Not again. He would not be weak in front of her.

She, on the other hand, remained calm and contained. “You're wrong. I know exactly how it feels.”

This wasn't enough to appease Wylan, however. He was an unstable mix of chemicals on an over-fueled burner, threatening to explode and send glass shrapnel into everyone's eyes. “It's easy for Jesper to say that he doesn't care right now, but in the long run, everybody does! I can't read a birthday card or a love letter; can't write any either! I can't read the labels on bottles! Ghezen! I'm probably going to die a pathetic death because I won't be able to read a sign about a faulty gas pipe!! Everybody says they don't care, when in the first throes of passion, but in the long haul, I always become an inconvenience. I’m the disposable kind of lover, and I don't see how it would be any different with Jesper! I can't get any good, respectable job, because those require reading skills! I can't buy a house on my own, since I can't read a contract! I’ll always depend on others for so many things! I don't want to be Jesper's ball and chain! He doesn't need me as a burden. He doesn't need me getting in the way of his fun…”

Wylan had said more in one breath than he probably had in months, and a heavy sort of fatigue fell on his shoulder like a cape made out of lead.

Inej stayed silent for a little while, probably waiting to see if he had some more shame to express. Then, she took a deep breath. “And you think I don't depend on Jes and his guns, or Kaz and his schemes, or Nina and her small science, or you and your chemistry?” she pointed out. “Having to lean on others is not a bad thing, Wylan. We all have our strengths and our weaknesses, but us Crows have each other, first and foremost. Together we have a lot more chances to succeed, or stay alive.”

Wylan remained quiet, looking down, picking on his nails.

“If you hadn't created that false firepox epidemic, Kaz's scheme against Rollins would've never worked,” Inej reminded him. “Maybe I'd be back at the Menagerie as we speak. Kaz and Jes would be in Hellgate, awaiting a trial for murder, or floating, lifeless, in a canal somewhere.”

Wylan shuddered as he imagined Jesper floating on his back in the Siljkcanal, with his top hat in the water beside him, his warm, chocolate eyes forever lightless and immobile, staring into the void, the blueish-gray tint of death having overcome the beautiful glow of his brown skin. He shook his head to chase the image.

“If you hadn't helped us,” Inej added, “I certainly wouldn't be free from my indenture contract.” She stood from the bed, walked up to the stairs, and squatted down to be at his eyes level. “You’re a Crow. You're one of us. We can't just leave you behind. Come back to the Slat with me and talk to Jesper...please?”

Wylan tore a hangnail off his forefinger and watched a drop of blood bloom on his pale skin. “I don't what to talk to Jesper. It hurts too much.”

“Fair enough,” she conceded, rising back to her feet. “But, if you won't do it for him, or for me, at least do it for yourself. What do you have with you right now, 300 Kruge?”

“470 kruge”, he corrected. He still had some money left from the bomb that destroyed the Crow Club and the old Slat, not that he'd remind Inej of the role he played in that.

“That'll only sustain you for what; two months or so? And then, what will you do? Nikolai Lantsov is promising us riches. Realistically, I think we could walk away from this job with 400 000 kruge each. That would set you up for many, many years. You wouldn't even have to work for Kaz anymore, if you don't want to. You could go wherever you want, and buy yourself a nice home.”

He dared lifting his head to look at her properly. “What's in it for you?” he asked, curious. “I can't believe you’re doing it for the money. You're not like Kaz… or Jesper.”

On instinct, her hand sought the hilt of one of the daggers strapped to her leather vest. “I must assist Sankta Alina. She's a true saint, and a kind, generous soul. She needs my help.”

“You've met her in person, the Sun Summoner?”

“Yes, and I truly believe she can make the Fold disappear, make this world a better, safer place.”

If this mission was truly about the lessening of the general misery of the world, who was he to stay put and do nothing? If an illiterate dimwit like him could make any difference, perhaps it was his duty to participate. It might be the only opportunity he'd ever get in his life to do some good.

“As for Jesper, I’ll let him know you need your space for now,” Inej stated, reaching out to help him stand from the stairs.

“Hopefully, It’ll give him the time he needs to forget about me and move on,” he reflected grimly, still accepting her offered hand.

“I think you're underestimating his stubbornness.”

“I think you’re overestimating my appeal,” he replied, tit for tat, once he was standing again.

“Let’s go back to the Slat, shall we? I’ll escort you.”

“Fine. Let me grab my satchel and a couple more bottles. Battling shadow monsters… who knows what that'll entail.”

***

Outside, the rainpour had stopped, but everything was still dripping : the edges of roofs, the business signs, the railings of balconies, the clothes and umbrellas of passersby.

Wylan and Inej didn't exchange a single word on their way back to the Slat. A hearse pulled by two black horses drove past them at some point, and people probably thought they were part of the funerary procession.

The closer to the Dregs’ house they got, the more fidgety Wylan got, twisting the satchel straps across his shoulders. A new kind of anxiety made its home inside his chest. What was he going to see on Jesper’s face? Pity? Sadness? Shame? Disgust? Worst ; indifference?

He stepped inside the new Crow Club with his head tucked into his shoulders, bracing himself for whatever was to come.

Jesper was sitting at a table near the door with Nina, a mug of beer in front of him, and as soon as he saw them enter, he sprung up on his feet. “Wylan!” he called out. “Thank the Saints, I-”

He was stopped in his tracks by Inej, who shook her head no, extending her arm to prevent Jesper from catching up to Wylan, who was running in the opposite direction. “I'm sorry, Jes,” Inej said. “I convinced him to come back, but he’s not ready to talk to you yet. He’s still hurting.”

Jesper deflated. “Okay. I understand.”

And it’s all Wylan heard of their exchange, because he was already escaping up the stairs.

When Wylan came back downstairs a few minutes later, the passport safely tucked in his satchel with his flute and chemicals, Jesper threw him a quick glance, but carefully stayed away.

Kaz had found a passport for Inej, and when he handed it out to her, she gave him a hard look. Then, Zoya and he announced that the two of them would take a carriage to get to First Harbor as soon as possible, in order to get the ship ready for their departure for Shu Han. The others, namely Wylan, Jesper, Nina, Tolya and Inej, would walk there.

Once Zoya and Kaz were gone, the five others set out on foot down Barkenstraat. It was an awkward and delicate affair for Wylan to follow the group, and still avoid having to walk beside Jesper. Tolya, however, was a fast walker. Much to Wylan’s relief, at some point, he distanced the others, taking the lead by a dozen paces. This gave Wylan an excuse to do the same, and he jogged to catch up on him.

“Hey! You're …Tolya, right?” he tried, in hope to strike up a conversation of any kind. “I'm Wylan.”

Tolya smiled. “Yes, I remember.”

“You do?” Wylan asked, surprised.

“Of course.”

Wylan had never deemed himself to be especially recognizable. Kaz had introduced him earlier, but he still didn't expect Tolya to have actually memorized his name.

The warrior was carrying a book in his hand, with a gray cover. The letters from the title looked like a collection of garden implements. “What's this?” Wylan asked, pointing at the book, in hope to keep the conversation going. Talking about a book in a foreign language was infinitely more comfortable. He didn't have to invent an excuse to explain why he wasn't able to decipher the title.

It was Tolya's turn to raise his eyebrows in surprise, as if he had not anticipated that Wylan would show interest in it. “It's a book of poems from the 3rd Shu dynasty; the golden age of collaborative poetry,” he explained, looking delighted. “Do you like poetry?”

For obvious reasons, Wylan hadn't been exposed to a lot of poetry throughout his life. “I like...songs?” he supplied, hoping this would be a satisfactory answer.

“They're pretty much the same. Poems are the music of bare words.”

Wylan returned Tolya's smile. “I like that idea.”

“Do you want me to read one for you?” Tolya offered, already flicking through the pages as they crossed over the Geldcanal on Ijzer Bridge.

“I don't speak Shu, but sure.”

Tolya read aloud a page or so of complex verses, as they kept on walking. Wylan had heard the Shu language before, many times in fact, but now that he paid true attention to the sounds, it reminded him of a violin bow going back and forth on finely tuned strings, and, somehow, of the noise of an old wheelbarrow going down a winding garden path.

“I'm afraid I didn't understand anything,” Wylan admitted, once Tolya was over, “but I still liked the music of it, like you said.”

Already, Tolya was flicking through some more pages. He stopped and tapped his forefinger on a specific one. “Actually, this one here you could understand. The Kaelish made it into a song. Then, the song was translated into Kerch by that famous author from the last century, Bram Van Beek.”

Wylan shook his head. “Never heard of him.” No surprise there ; he wasn't well-versed in literary history either.

“I think I still know the kerch version. I learned it by heart a few years back,” Tolya said, clearly eager to share it, and Wylan wasn't going to deny him that pleasure.

“I'd love to hear it.”

Tolya cleared his throat.

Come all you fair folks, now take a warning
Don't ever heed what a young man say
He’s like a star on a foggy morning
When you think he’s near
He is far away

I've left my father; I've left my mother
I've left my brothers, and my sisters too
I've left my home, and my fond dwelling
And my young love, for the sake of you

Oh love is teasing
And love is pleasing
And love's a pleasure, when first it is new
But as love grows older
It still grows colder
And fades away, like the morning dew

Wylan couldn't help a glance over his shoulder, at Jesper, who was walking with Inej some twenty steps back. Their eyes met for a split second, and they both immediately looked away.

This wordless exchange between the two of them hadn't escaped Tolya's notice.

“I assume that you can relate to this particular poem,” he remarked.

Wylan's response was evasive at best. “Not exactly.”

Tolya didn't insist, and Wylan was grateful for it.

No epic love poems, even the tragic ones, could apply to a history as brief and as inconsequential as the one he had had with Jesper Fahey.

***

When they arrived at First Harbor, it was the middle of the afternoon and the place was a hub of activity. Jesper and Wylan had been here the night before, but further, in the northern part of the harbor, where the dockers worked. Here, in the southern portion, stood the quays and wharves where rich tourists moored their ships and got their first taste of Ketterdam. The place was safely sheltered from the Barrel by the barrier of nice architecture offered by the Zelver District and the Geldstraat. These were the images you could see on travel brochures.

Multiple stalls and small, quaint shops, offered kerch souvenirs of many kinds; perfumes, incenses, wrought iron sculptures, flower bulbs, books, maps and engravings, but also animals for private menageries, most of them imported from Novyi Zem ; birds of flamboyant plumage and sad-looking monkeys in cages.

Wylan needed red phosphorus, and potassium chlorate, but he wouldn't find it here. He still wandered between the stalls and stands, having nothing better to do as the crew of their ship were still working on the sails.

Jesper was standing with Zoya and Kaz on the quay next to the Volkvony, his hands resting lazily on the handles of his revolvers. Still, Wylan knew he was being observed. He felt Jesper's gaze burn a hole through the back of his head. It provoked a ticklish sensation between his shoulder blades, much like on the night of their first meeting at Club Cumulus. Jesper had spent hours watching his every move through the gambling hall. Of course, it was different this time. Jesper didn't look at Wylan like an exotic bird he wanted to capture, but like a dangerous explosive he didn't know how to safely handle.

Wylan’s wanderings brought him to the display window of a fossils and mineralogy shop. The colors of the minerals were dazzling and the shapes of the fossils intricate and fascinating. He would love to own such a collection, but what use would it be to him now? Perhaps, one day, he’d buy one, if he managed to have a house ; the one Inej said he'd be able to get with the money from the job. A home. He had never truly had one of those. The Van Eck mansion never quite managed to be that for him, not since his mother’s death anyway. If anything, it had been more of a gilded cage, like the one containing the depressed monkeys he had seen earlier.

The last stand he visited had crates upon crates of freshly harvested tulip bulbs, with the name and colors of each variety written on the side. Wylan could only resort to his imagination to picture what the flowers might look like. One of Alys’ gardeners had once listed for Wylan's benefit all of the varieties he knew, as he was filling the flower beds with bulbs and Wylan was sitting on the mansion’s front stairs. Some of the names had stuck with him for some reason; the burgundy Empress’ Tea Cups tulips ; the orange and red Adored Flames of Lij; the pink Nymph Thighs; or the white Sankta Rectina's Pillowcases.

In another life, maybe, he and Jesper could be standing there, laughing together at some of the most ridiculous names, but not in this one, though, because Wylan was an imbecile who couldn't read, and Jesper was-

Where was Jesper as a matter of fact? Kaz and Zoya were still in a conversation. He could spot Nina eating a large rhubarb and fennel seeds pretzel she bought on the market. She was currently trying to get Tolya to taste a piece of it. Inej was already onboard the Volkvony, but he couldn't see Jesper anywhere. Maybe he had disappeared into one of the shops.

Wylan walked through the square and joined Nina and Tolya. Just as he was about to open his mouth to say something, a familiar voice called his name. He turned to see Jesper walking toward him with purpose. The others took this as their cue to vanish. Wylan gulped, hoping they had stayed around. Now he had to face this alone.

Clearly, Jesper could see Wylan's discomfort, because as soon as he reached him, he declared : “I know you don't really want to speak to me right now, so I'll be brief. I just wanted to give you this, and then I'll leave you alone.”

He handed Wylan a flat, rectangular object, wrapped in brown paper. The weight, the shape of it, made his stomach climb into his throat. “What's this, Jesper?” he asked, his voice still miraculously even.

“A present,” Jesper replied, with a nervous attempt at a smile.

Wylan unwrapped the “present” although he truly wished he didn't have to. Inside, he found exactly what he was dreading. “A book? Is that some sort of joke? Because I don't find it funny.”

His cold reaction seemed to take Jesper aback somehow. “No!! Listen, I'm not making fun of you, I promise,” he hastened to say. “It's just a way to tell you that I understand. There are so many people like you in the Barrel, children who had to start working young, to support their families - and people who lost their parents, like you did, and they had to fend for themselves. They didn't have the opportunity to go to school and learn. All I'm saying is that you're not alone.”

Wylan had gone pale.

“I've seen how interested you were in Tolya's poetry,” Jesper went on, “so, I figured that if you want, I could take the time to teach you to read?”

He wished Jesper would stop talking, and yet he didn't.

“When I first met Inej, she only knew how to read and write in Suli, not Kerch,” Jesper recalled. “But I taught her. She was a quick learner, and as intelligent as you are, I'm sure you'll pick it up in no time at all.”

For the second time since the morning, or perhaps even the third, Wylan turned into an experiment gone wrong. Jesper had mixed exactly the worst combination of all the worst ingredients.“You think I didn't try to learn?” he hissed, furious. “You think nobody tried to teach me? Trust me they did, for years! I just can't be taught!” He brandished the poisoned gift Jesper just gave him, pointing at the title, which he had no hope to ever be able to understand. “You see letters here, do you? You see words? You see meaning? All I see is a jumble of lines, like twigs fallen at random from a tree! That part of my brain just doesn't function! You say you understand, but you don't, Jesper! You don't understand anything about me! We've had a one-night stand a month ago, and we've been fucking again for three days and that's it! You don't know me! You've no idea where I come from, so don't pretend like you can just show up, be some sort of savior, and fix me! I can't be fixed, do you understand?!” He shoved the book at Jesper's chest, along with the half-undone wrapping. “Keep this! I don't need a reminder of how stupid and defective I am!”

He left Jesper standing there, mouth agape, tongue-tied, and shell-shocked.

Wylan climbed the ladder to board the ship as fast as he could, eager to put distance between himself and the source of his anguish. Nina threw him a look of concern when he stormed past her, but Wylan ignored it and retreated to the ship's stern. He hoped no one would bother him there, or worse, try to be sympathetic.

Half an hour later, when Zoya made the sail inflate and that the Volkvony glided off from the quay, Wylan looked down overboard and saw the book Jesper had tried to give him. It was floating, pages down, into the harbor.

***

The coast of Kerch had disappeared from view under the blue line of the horizon. By then, Wylan's anger had abated somehow. He felt nauseous more than anything else, and he wished he was anywhere else but on that ship. It was way too late to jump overboard and swim back to the Barrel, though.

Kaz reunited his Crows on the main deck for a debrief. They were standing in a circle, the five of them. Wylan was stubbornly staring at a nail in the deck’s planking as Kaz spoke about flying out on a second ship once they'd be close enough to the coast of Shu Han. He then said something else about wanting to spare the fuel. It didn't make a lot of sense, and Wylan wasn't really listening. His face was burning, and he was scared of looking up at Jesper’s face, scared to see his own hurt reflected on his expression.

Kaz dismissed them, and, at a loss of anything else to do with himself, Wylan sat down on the deck on the port side of the ship, his back to the railing, clinging to his satchel as if this was some sort of lifebuoy.

Inej and Jesper were standing together at starboard, speaking in a hush tone, heads leaning toward one another, engrossed in their secret discussion. Jesper was picking at something– a wood splinter perhaps – on top of the railing.

Wylan took this opportunity to study his former lover's profile against the sunset. Jesper wasn't that handsome, he thought. He wasn't anywhere near perfect, in fact. The base of his nose was definitely on the larger side. He didn't have a “strong” chin – one could even argue he had a weak one. He had somewhat of a large forehead as well. His cheekbones showed traces of scarrings he probably acquired from a bout of acne in his teenage years.

He knew, of course, that this was a useless exercise.

Finding flaws in Jesper was a strategy concocted by his own mind to try and lessen the pain; to make this perceived loss less of a wound. The truth, however, was that Wylan found Jesper to be an exquisite-looking man even despite these “flaws”, and perhaps even because of them. Besides, he had knowledge ; a kind that couldn't be erased.

He knew Jesper didn't only have gorgeous lips, but that they were also plush and soft, and he knew it because he had been kissed by them. He was aware that Jesper's long-fingered hands could be deadly when allowed to work the trigger of a gun, but that they could also be smooth and so gentle, when they roamed over a naked body. He knew that those deep brown eyes could sparkle from mischief as well as kindness, because he had seen them do both. And that was the whole problem, because no matter how hard he would try to detest Jesper, the desire he felt for him; this yearning; it would still be there, growing even stronger as time went on. In other words, Wylan was doomed to suffer as long as he remained in Jesper’s orbit.

“Well, this is boring!” Nina complained loudly, dropping down on the deck to sit next to Wylan. “We need entertainment! I'd take anything at that point!”

Tolya perked up at that, already looking through his book. “I could recite a poem or two,” he suggested.

“No!” Zoya objected, from where she minded the main sail, making poor Tolya shrink in on himself.

“Fine,” he grunted, closing his book. He took his leave and disappeared below deck.

Jesper cleared his throat, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. “Maybe Wylan has his flute with him? I've never had the privilege to hear him play, but if he's as talented with it as he is on the piano forte, I know we're in for a treat.”

Wylan didn't budge, but he found the courage to look Jesper in the eye. “You have heard me before, actually. You just didn't listen.”

“Sorry?”

“At the kaelish party last night; Rory lent me his flute. I played an entire song. People danced to it.”

“That's-that's not possible,” Jesper stuttered. “I was there. I would hav-”

“You were busy gambling,” Wylan cut him off.

A look of mortification took over Jesper's face as the meaning of the words sunk in. “Saints, Wylan. I'm so sorry. I'm-”

“It's fine. You didn't know.”

It wasn't fine. Wylan was anything but fine. Still holding on to his satchel, he rose to his feet and, for the umpteenth time since the morning, he fled. Walking away from discomfort was the only thing he could do. Between fight and flight, he would always choose the latter. He was too weak to fight anything or anyone. What was he even doing here?

He found himself at the bow of the ship, in the sole company of the figurehead, but not for long, because soon enough, Nina joined him.

“Trouble in paradise?” she asked, as she stopped next to him, cocking her head to the side; gentle, but definitely curious.

Wylan gritted his teeth. He didn't want to be put in the hot seat by a heartrender right now, no matter how good-intentioned. “It's complicated.”

“I don't doubt it.”

It wasn't that complicated, in fact. Wylan just didn't have the energy to explain. “If you're here because you're bored, just know I won't spill the tea. I've no gossip to give.”

“Well, I am bored, it's true,” she conceded. “But I'm not here for that. I'm here because you're my friend, and I can feel distress pumping through your veins like poison, and I don't like it.”

That she could hear the depth of his inner turmoil through his heartbeat wasn't the piece of information he latched onto. “I'm… I’m your friend?”

A smile stretched her lips. “Of course you are, silly!”

“I've never really had friends,” he admitted, rubbing the back of his neck, “or a steady lover, for that matter. And I feel like I'm very bad at having any of those.”

Nina laughed, but it wasn't unkind. It was fond, if anything. “I'm going to tell you a secret,” she said in a conspiratorial tone, “nobody has the recipe. Everybody kind of eyeballs it and hopes for the best.”

“I'm a bomb-maker,” he reminded her, not able to chase the sour tinge from his voice. “I feel like this metaphor could get pretty dangerous in my case.”

“Do you want a hug, then?” she offered, opening her arms. “I feel hugs make a lot of things better.”

Without thinking, he stepped into her embrace and she closed her arms around his shoulders. It had been a long time since a woman last hugged him. He couldn't even recall when that was, in fact. It felt nice, warm and secure. He was reluctant to let go just yet, so she kept holding him until he was the one who stepped back.

Her hands lingered over the front of his shoulders. “Hugs probably can't make Jes less of an idiot, though, huh?”

Wylan shook his head, averting his gaze. “He's not an idiot. If anything, I am the idiot.”

“Impossible,” she declared, cupping his face and squeezing his cheeks. “You're an adorable angel who can do no wrong.”

He heaved a deep sigh. “I wish that was true.”

Chapter Text

It's better to act without thinking, than think without acting.

So far, that motto had served Jesper well, and it was still serving him right now, because an impulsive decision had led to him being deliciously pressed to the wall of a horse stall, with an eager tongue trying to get past his lips. He allowed it. Of course he was going to allow it ; this and so much more. He grabbed the boy's cap, threw it to the floor, and pulled the rough wool jacket off his shoulders. He spun them around, inverting their positions, and latched his teeth onto the tender skin of his neck. He smelled of hay, horsehair and a hint of musk, something Jesper didn't mind at all.

Jesper yanked the young man's suspenders off his shoulders, and tugged on his shirt, to pass it over his head. The piece of garment was far too large for him – any shirt would probably look too large for his narrow frame. He had lean shoulders and leaner arms; quite skinny for someone handling such powerful beasts as draft horses on a daily basis. He was exactly Jesper's type. He liked pale-skinned boys, thin ones, almost evanescent; perhaps because his brief stories with them would be as fleeting as they looked.

The stablehand was fumbling with the buttons on Jesper’s stolen coachman jacket, so he helped things along, eager to meet bare skin with his own. The process, however, was slowed down by the hurried, almost ferocious kisses they kept on exchanging, barely taking the time to breathe in-between. They had a limited amount of time to burn this passion to the ground, before they'd get caught or interrupted. There was no space for sensual exploration. Time was of the essence, but the kissing was so good in itself that Jesper wanted to roll around that sensation like a dog in freshly cut grass.

The boy’s hands were soft and smooth, despite the hard labor his profession required; a quality Jesper couldn't fail to appreciate, but what had tipped him over the edge were those inquisitive blue eyes, and that twinkle of something impish behind them.

The memory of a recent lover flashed into Jesper's memory : a boy in a Komedie Brute mask. He too had soft, delicate hands, and a tiny waist. Did he have blue eyes as well? Jesper couldn't remember. He only saw them in dim lighting. He’d likely never know their true color, but he liked to imagine that they were blue; like a zemini sky in summer.

A slight pang of guilt snapped Jesper back to the present. You're a bad one, Jesper Fahey.
He was undressing that ravkan stablehand while thinking of another man. Here. Now. These were the only things that should count; the whole reason why he engaged in that sort of sexual encounter in the first place. It was all about the present – all about putting a halt to the constant race of his thoughts for a few blissful moments.

“What's your name?” Jesper asked, as he unbuttoned the front of the boy’s trousers.

The other bared his teeth in a teasing smile. “Doesn't really matter, does it?”

The answer could have stung, but it wasn't the first time a lover flat-out refused to tell Jesper their name. Besides, this whole interaction had begun with a lie anyway. Jesper was no more a zemini ambassador's coachman than Kaz was a ballerina.

Jesper pressed the young man to the wall once again, grinding his hips into his, just to hear him groan; just to make him writhe against his own body. “No, I guess it doesn't matter,” he purred in his ear.

The boy had taken control again, and brought Jesper to the hay-covered floor, on the pile of his discarded clothes. Jesper enjoyed this little fight for dominance ; this little push and pull. The young man rid Jesper of his breeches and underwear, and opened Jesper's waistcoat and shirt to bare his skin. He gave his neck and chest a few perfunctory kisses, then pushed Jesper's legs open, his knees up, seeking his eyes, asking silent permission to take this to the next level.

Jesper nodded, ready to surrender to penetration.

The boy had nothing else but a bit of spit to ease his way in, and Jesper screwed his eyes shut, knowing to expect a slight sting at first. He bit his lower lip, hard, to stifle a moan. There was pleasure underneath that ache, just asking to be released.

The boy touched his face, cupping his cheek. “Are you alright?”

Jesper opened his eyes. “I’m more than fine,” he assured him.“I’m a little rusty. It's been a while,” he warned, “but other than that, I’m all yours to enjoy, darling.”

The young man understood that this was an invitation to start nice and slow, at least until Jesper could adjust and get used to the sensation. He proceeded with a leisurely undulation of his hips, taking the time to bring Jesper to the point where he could start enjoying the delightful friction.

All the horseback riding he had done in childhood, coupled with the marksmanship, had developed surprisingly strong core muscles on Jesper, and he made good use of them by lifting his chest up, and bringing his hands down to his lover’s hips. He adjusted his grip to set a more rapid pace, controlling the depth and rhythm of the boy's thrusts inside him. “Yes, that's it. That's it, darling,” Jesper encouraged him, his voice getting lower, hoarser. “Th-this is perfect. You’re doing so good. Keep going, love.”

Once they had set a tempo that pleased both of them, Jesper moved one of his hands from the boy's hip to the back of his neck, pulling him forward, until their foreheads were pressed together. The boy mimicked him, anchoring himself to the nape of Jesper’s neck. This way, they could pant and moan against each other's lips, as pleasure kept mounting, and mounting, and mounting. This is how Jesper liked it best ; to be able to lose himself into his lover. He only knew three sure ways to stop being in his own head so much and completely inhabit his body: gun fights, dance and sex.

As the sweet tightness at the bottom of his stomach became inescapable, Jesper let go of his lover’s hip, trusting he'd keep up his excellent work. He wrapped his free hand around himself, stroking in tandem with the deep, thorough thrusts being inflicted to his deliciously overheating, trembling and strained body.

The boy captured his lips in a bruising kiss as he climaxed.
Jesper followed soon after.

He was giggling, elated, a bit delirious, as he let himself fall back into his makeshift mattress of hay and discarded clothes. His lover pulled out and rolled off of him, out of breath.

“This was…” the stable boy raved, trying to gather his wits.

“Yeah!” Jesper agreed with a matching enthusiasm, reaching aside to squeeze his forearm.

“I mean…”

“I know!”

“Dima?!” a voice shouted through the stables, putting an abrupt end to their broken pieces of dialog. Startled, Jesper sat in a hurry. He couldn't afford to be discovered here, half naked, and then questioned by the palace’s staff. This was the voice of the stablemaster, no doubt looking for his assistant. “Dima!!!” The boy had a name afterall.

“I have to go,” Dima regretted, looking at Jesper with a twinge of sorrow in his pretty blue eyes.

Jesper forced a smile. “I understand.” Of course he did; how couldn't he? This was never meant to last. It could only be brief, ephemeral; a thread already severed just as it was woven into existence.

"But this was…”

“I agree.”

It had been good sex ; great even. And yet, there was something missing that Jesper couldn't quite pinpoint : something that eluded him and kept him waiting, holding his breath.

It's Dima who touched Jesper first, placing his warm hand to the side of his neck, but Jesper’s mouth was the quickest to find his.

Jesper wanted this – needed this – the goodbye kiss. They wouldn't have the time to savor it, however, but as they inched apart, Jesper took a second or two to etch that face into his memory. He hadn't had the opportunity to do this with the last boy he held in his arms. Instead, he had been left high and dry, with a cold, empty bed the next morning. He knew he would never see Dima again, but at the very least, he had tasted his lips and looked into his eyes one last time.

Dima scrambled back into his trousers, grabbed the rest of his clothes scattered in the hay, and sneaked out of the horse stall like a thief in the night.

Jesper watched him go with a lump in his throat. He should be used to these passing shadows by now. And yet, somehow they hurt, each and every time, to various degrees.

“Where you are doesn't matter nearly as much as who you're with.”
Perhaps this was the only thing he told Dima that wasn't complete bullshit. The problem remained that no matter where Jesper was : be it Ravka or Ketterdam, he always ended up on his own.

***

Jesper flexed his hands to chase the antsy sensation – the nervous prickling beneath his skin was coursing all the way up his arms. He hated waiting lines with a passion, and while the customs office in Bhez Ju wouldn't make them wait for more than fifteen or twenty minutes, it felt as if Jesper had been stuck in that queue for six hours already. This was made a lot worse by the fact he was standing just behind Wylan. All Jesper could do was stare at the back of Wylan’s head, itching to thread his fingers into that ridiculous mop of tousled, chestnut curls, and undo some non-existent knots. This wouldn't be appropriate and he suspected the touch would be unwelcome anyway.

For the fourth time, he considered clearing his throat, or coughing, just to catch Wylan’s attention. But then, what would he do? What would he say? Would Wylan even turn around to acknowledge him? He doubted it. Since they got off the Lantsov prince's flying craft, Jesper still hadn't mustered the courage to speak to Wylan, or found anything clever or funny to say, which was out of character. He was the king of flirting; unmatched, and yet, Wylan's own hurt and anger kept throwing him off his game.

An unexpected opportunity presented itself when the line moved and Wylan pulled his forged passport from his leather satchel.

Jesper leaned forward and whispered. “It's Cletus.”

Wylan’s shoulders shook. Was this a shiver (the pleasant kind), or a shudder of horror? Jesper couldn't tell.

“What?”

“The name on your passport,” Jesper clarified. “I thought you’d like to know before you speak to the officer. You're Cletus Phrebeny, 16 years old, from Saint-Hilde. The age is probably another one of Kaz's poor attempts at humor. I wouldn't pay it any heed if I were you.”

The line moved some more.

“I know what's on the passport,” Wylan whispered back between clenched teeth, staring straight ahead. “Inej told me already.”

“For the record, I think Wylan is a much better name,” Jesper commented. “It’s very pretty, just –”

“Sorry,” Wylan cut him off. The officer had gestured for him to walk up to his table, and Wylan left Jesper there, with the end of the sentence still on his lips: 

“ –just like you.” 

“Don't be daft. Give up, or you'll end up hurting him even more, and hurting yourself in the process.”

“But I can't give up! I want to kiss that stupid face again!”

Ever since they left Ketterdam, Jesper's inner monologue had been similar to a bickery dialogue between two Komedy Brute characters.

“There are other boys out there, girls too; ones that would be more than happy to end up lying under you; plenty of fish in the sea. Why this one?”

“Because there’s no other Wylan; in the sea or otherwise.”

As they left the customs’ building, Jesper was hit with a myriad of smells, from the spices displayed in clay bowls, and sounds from the vendors’ animated discussions and the street performers’ foreign musical instruments. The market next to the port was packed. There must have been some sort of festival going on, because even the animals being paraded around had colorful accessories. This was the first time Jesper set foot in Bhez Ju. It should have been an exciting adventure, full of new discoveries, and yet, his sole focus was on one, specific young man.

Wylan stopped dead in his tracks and grabbed Nina by the sleeve. “Nina! Look! I think they have alpacas over there!” Further down the street, a man was indeed leading four or five of those ridiculous, curly haired, long-necked donkeys on a long leash.

“Oh, yes,” Nina acknowledged, apparently not sharing his level of excitement.

“If only we could see them better,” Wylan regretted, trying to get as high on his tiptoes as he could. “The crowd is really dense.”

For the first time in his life, Jesper wished he was an alpaca.

“It's because today is the Feast of the Dead, to honor the departed,” Nina explained.

“I can lift you up on my shoulders,” Jesper wanted to offer Wylan. “Hell! I'll even buy you one! I'll buy you a whole herd of alpacas if you would just look at me!”
If only he could think of something to do; anything to say that would make Wylan look at him the same way he did when they danced together at the céilí. That night, Wylan had gaze at him with such adoration Jesper had had to relearn how to breathe. But then, of course, he had to go and spoil it, by giving in to the call of dice. What if Wylan never looked at him that way ever again? He’d only have himself to blame for it.

A shrine had been erected in the middle of the street. It was overflowing with all sorts of offerings: fruits, silk pouches filled with wheat, flower necklaces and coins. Tolya, Zoya, Inej and Nina stopped there to pray and offer burning incense to their dearly departed.

Not being a man of faith in the slightest, Kaz chose to stand aside, leaning on his cane. Jesper joined him there. Following the direction of Kaz's gaze, he wasn't surprised to find out he was staring right at where Inej had kneeled to pray.

“Why are our love lives so complicated, huh?” Jesper said in a sigh.

His show of solidarity was met with a groan. “I've no idea why you feel the need to include me in that statement, but I want no part in it.”

Wylan had purchased one single stick of incense, but after he had lit it and left it on the shrine, he didn't stay there in contemplation like the others did, and he walked up the street to meet the more atheist members of their traveling group. Instead of standing next to Jesper, however, he went to Kaz’s side, using him as a shield or a barrier between the two of them. Jesper couldn't help but resent that strategy. How could he throw Wylan longing looks, with Kaz standing in the middle like a jaded vulture on a telegraph wire? The distance between them was killing him; the emotional one, for sure, but the physical one even more so. Jesper expressed most of his affection by touching. And to go cold turkey from being able to take Wylan by the hand, put his arm around his shoulders or waist at will, or drag him into a hug, left a sour void in his chest.

Tolya was the next to rise to his feet and leave the shrine, eating something from a paper bag: dried squid, most likely. He hadn't stopped raving about that snack while they were still on the Volkvony. “So just you know, it's considered bad luck not to honor the dead during Suntsa Sar,” he told Kaz and Jesper.

Jesper snorted. “If I truly believed in luck, I'd be in a lot less debt.” It was meant to be some sort of witty joke, but, from the look of it, it had gone way over Wylan’s head. No luck there either.

“And I'm more concerned with the living than the dead,” Kaz stated.

“Tend not to your ghosts, and they'll come back hungry,” Tolya warned them, but that discourse had little bearing on Jesper's beliefs, and even less on Kaz’s.

“The tea shop should be open now,” Kaz grumbled, before limping toward the shrine to collect Inej and Nina. He needed both of them to accomplish the part of his plan that implied meeting a woman called Ohval Saran at the teashop she owned downtown, and gathering intel on the blade.

With Kaz gone, Wylan had lost his protective barrier, and a slight panic showed on his face at the prospect of being left alone with Jesper. “Uh Tolya?” he blurted out. “I was actually looking to buy some firing powders. Do you want to come?”

Still chewing on his squid, Tolya threw both Jesper and Wylan a quizzical look.

Jealousy reared its ugly head. “Why does he want to go with Tolya? What does Tolya have that I don't? He’s not more interesting than I can be…

Nah, this is just an excuse he’s using to avoid you.

Jesper wouldn't give Wylan the satisfaction, however. “Always been a fan of shopping,” he declared, falling into steps behind the two of them.

“Huh, for explosives?” Wylan asked, rightfully skeptical.

“Sure,” Jesper mumbled. If looking at bottles with unknown powders and liquids inside was what it took to manufacture a positive interaction with Wylan, then he’d do it.

They walked three street corners, until Tolya stopped in front of a tavern. “I think you can find what you need there,” he told Wylan, pointing at a few colorful stands further down the street.

“You don't have to come with me,” Wylan declared. “You can wait here.” He shot a furtive glance at Jesper, before he walked toward the vendors selling firecrackers, fireworks and the chemical supplies to make them.

“I'm gonna get rice pudding for myself,” Tolya declared, gesturing at the tavern’s open doors. “Do you want anything? A buckwheat beer perhaps? It’s on me.”

Jesper's eyes were still tracking Wylan through the dense crowd, and, truthfully, hadn't really listened to the offer. “Yeah, okay, thank you.”

Tolya was back a few minutes later, with a bowl and chopsticks, along with Jesper's drink in an earthenware mug. They sat at a table outside, on the side of the street.

“What's this again?” Jesper asked, squinting at the content of the mug.

Tolya chuckled. “Just drink it.”

The taste was crisp and left a dry, almost raspy texture on Jesper’s tongue. It wasn't disagreeable per say, just unusual. After three or four sips, it started to grow on him.

“Wylan’s different, isn't he?” Tolya said, all of a sudden.

“What do you mean?”

“When I was told I was going to meet the Crows, the infamous band of thieves and criminals from Ketterdam’s red-light district, he’s not exactly what I was picturing in my mind, to be perfectly honest,” Tolya admitted. “Kaz? For sure. Someone like you or Inej, I could conceive,…but Wylan?”

Jesper sniggered. “Just wait until you see him explode something.” He tapped his malachite ring against the edge of the table. “The boy has spunk.”

Tolya tilted his head to the side, curious. “And that’s what you like about him?”

Jesper took one more sip. “Yes. Amongst other things.” He licked the foam from his upper lip. Across the street, Wylan was trying to mime something to a vendor, in hope to overcome the language barrier.

Tolya, on the other hand, had nothing better to do than digging into the cause of Jesper’s pining. “Go on, then. What did you do to him?”

“Nothing.”

“Clearly you've done something stupid.”

“I did not do anything stupid,” Jesper stated. “Didn't you, though?” his mind corrected. “I said something stupid. Many stupid things, in fact.”

“Well, how will you fix it?”

Jesper scoffed. “If I knew that, I wouldn't be speaking to you now, would I?”

“Funny you say that – there's a poem–”

“This will be incentive enough,” Jesper cut it short, raising to his feet and downing the rest of his beer to give himself some courage; ‘Kerch courage’ some would call it. “Shu courage” in this specific case.

Jesper straightened the knot on his tie as he crossed the twenty yards between the table and the fireworks stand. Wylan was absorbed in the content of a box of black pellets and holding a vial of red powder in his right hand. Jesper snatched this opportune conversation piece from his grip.

“What's this?”

The tip of Wylan's ears turned pink, but he stayed put, which Jesper could only take as a good sign. He cleared his throat and took the vial back. “It's red phosphorus. It's rare in Ketterdam, but if you mix it with potassium chlorate,” he explained, waving the vial of white powder in his other hand, “it creates a surprisingly strong contact explosion.”

“How do you know what mixes with what?” Jesper asked. He was already in awe of Wylan's intellect. He would have called him booksmart in a heartbeat. Now that he knew it had nothing to do with books, and that Wylan had to garner that knowledge in more creative ways, he found it all the more impressive.

“It's just chemistry… I had a tu- Just,” Wylan stuttered, the pink of his ears turning a few shades darker and spreading down to his cheeks, “just trial and error.”

“With explosives?”

Wylan blinked, but maintained eye contact. “When the sample size is small enough, the explosions are relatively manageable.”

Jesper smiled, sincere. “You've got all of that in your head, and you still got all your fingers. You might be the smartest person I know…”

“Tolya!!” Wylan called out like an alarm signal. “Tolya!? Could I get your help please?”

“Wh-what?” Jesper muttered, as he watched Wylan running away once again, get past Tolya and disappear inside an apothecary shop.

“What happened?” Tolya mouthed, from where he still sat at their table.

Jesper threw his hands up in defeat. He couldn't, for the life of him, figure out what he had said wrong this time.

It's what you said about his fingers! Why did you have to bring it up again? What's with that weird obsession?

I was just trying to pay him a compliment!

How many kind words would it take for him to regain Wylan's affection? Jesper still had many more in his arsenal ; all of them genuine, but they seemed to slide off Wylan without touching him, like water on a duck’s back. Even worse, it appeared that with every new attempt he made at reconciliation, he just kept digging his grave deeper.

Before Jesper could go in pursuit of his elusive lover, the firework vendor hailed him, pointing at the palm of their hand, demanding money. “Bloody saints,” Jesper cussed, and reached inside his coat to pay for the chemicals.

Tolya went inside the apothecary shop as Jesper waited outside. He pulled his box of jurda out of his coat and rolled four beads of it to pop in his mouth and chew. Then, to occupy his hands and calm his nerves, he pulled his revolvers out, twirling them at high speed. In Ketterdam, that sort of performance would attract impressed gawking. But here, people kept throwing him wary glances and Jesper had to remind himself that this wasn't the Barrel, where pointing guns at each other was practically a handshake. People here weren't accustomed to the sight of firearms being flaunted in the streets in broad daylight. With a deep sigh, he holstered them and started fidgeting with his rings instead; the next best option.

Kaz had told his Crows to reconvene at noon at the Red Robin Inn, across from Xu Tian Temple. As neither Jesper nor Wylan knew the layout of the city, Tolya took upon himself to guide them there. All the way to the inn, Wylan and Tolya walked ahead together, chatting about music and poetry, while Jesper was condemned to trail behind like a stray pup.

The chasm between him and Wylan had the size of a precipice now, and Jesper was running out of inspiration as to how to bridge that gap. If only he could talk to Wylan in equations…

“I can't make you any promises, or predict what might happen between us,” Jesper had told Wylan on their second night together. “I'm a mess most of the time. A handsome mess, mind you, but still – I just don't want you to get your expectations too high.” Maybe this whole situation had nothing to do with Jesper. Perhaps it was, in fact, all on Wylan for not listening well enough. Jesper couldn't be pinned down. He wasn't good at relationships, and he had tried to tell Wylan as much. He was good at pleasing people, but pretty bad at keeping them happy in the long run.

The Red Robin Inn was a small and unassuming establishment, tucked between a music shop and a mortgage broker's office. It had one single entrance door, green with a bird painted on it. Jesper understood why Kaz had chosen it. Nobody would come looking for them here.

The inn had a bar on the ground floor, with a few tables scattered in the cramped space, and probably no more than six rooms upstairs. As Zoya was already there, Tolya and Wylan sat down with her.

Jesper ordered a shot of sake at the bar, and then spotted two tourists clad in kilts, playing cards on the bartop. He observed them for a bit, his interest immediately piqued. The cards were different from the hearts, spades, clubs and diamonds they used at the Crow Club. He had never seen a card deck such as this one: with green, yellow and blue symbols on a black background. Not possessing a single shy bone in his tall body, Jesper greeted them in Kaelish and asked if he could join them. "I don't know that game ; could you teach me?”

The men were kind enough to include him, but, as it turned out, it was more a game of strategy than a game of chance ; not one you could bet money on anyway, and Jesper lost interest after half an hour. He excused himself and went to purchase another shot.

Zoya was now sitting alone at her table, writing in a notebook. Nina arrived soon after, but Kaz and Inej still had to make their appearance. Wylan and Tolya were nowhere to be seen and Jesper assumed they had gone out to purchase more strange-looking snacks.

Using the ravkan prince’s money, Tolya had already paid for a room on the second floor they could use as headquarters for the duration of their mission. Jesper went upstairs to have a look, maybe grab a bit of rest while he could.

The room, as it turned out, was surprisingly spacious; clean and cozy, in muted green tones. The silk panels on the walls represented a grove of wild cherry trees and it made Jesper think of his father's farm in Novyi Zem. The sliding doors to the balcony had been left ajar, and Jesper slipped through the opening, intending on enjoying the view on his own for a bit.

He was not on his own, however, and Wylan started when Jesper appeared. “Oh. I'm sorry,” Wylan apologized, frustratingly sweet and polite.

“No, I'm the one who should be sorry,” Jesper countered, “I didn't know you were there.”

“I just needed some fresh air,” Wylan explained, making a vague gesture at the sky and the animated street below.

“You didn't have enough fresh air on the ship, and on that ridiculous flying craft?” Jesper laughed gently, hoping his remark wouldn't pull any trigger this time.

“Apparently not,” Wylan replied. He rubbed the back of his neck. “I should go back inside.”

The balcony was narrow, and since Jesper refused to budge, Wylan didn't have a choice but to squeeze himself between him and the wall. The front of their bodies brush against one another and desire sizzled its way down Jesper's spinal column, coiling in his lower stomach like a grass snake. “Wylan, wait...”

Wylan stopped, staring up at him, big hazel eyes wide open. He was painfully beautiful, like one of those martyr portraits in churches, frozen in their saintly innocence. Jesper wanted to kiss him, press him up to that wall, rip his necktie off, send the buttons of his shirt flying everywhere, suck hard at his pulse point…

You want him so bad it makes you look stupid.

I don’t care.

You're just trying to get what you can't have; to toy with the uncertainty. Once a gambler, always a gambler.

Jesper took a gamble indeed. He reached out and touched Wylan's face, letting his fingers brush up his jawline, cup his cheek, and trace the curve of his earshell. Wylan shivered.

Jesper should have asked permission, but his skin was so soft and inviting right this instant; so warm, and alive, just like when they had first kissed and he had slipped his fingers underneath the Grey Imp mask. Wylan wore a different sort of mask now. And yet, while he didn't exactly lean into the touch, there was no anger or disgust in his expression, only surprise and wonderment.

Say something smart ; something charming. Once again, nothing came. “Wy, please,” Jesper whispered instead. He wasn't even sure what he was begging for. “Please hear me out”? “Please don't run away”? “Please, don't leave me again… don't leave me too”?

They were at a standstill, neither of them daring to move, speak, or even breathe.

The room’s paper doors slid open. Zoya's voice filled the space, followed by Inej's. Wylan closed his fingers around Jesper’s wrist and pulled his hand away from his face. “We should go inside.”

Jesper nodded, his heart plummeting toward the ground like a kite which tether had just been abruptly cut.

***

“I've tried everything, Nej, short of offering him a bunch of flowers,” Jesper complained, removing his top hat to brush some dust off of it. He stopped in his tracks for a second, missing a beat to their walk. “Do you think he'd want flowers, though?” he mused out loud.

“No, I don't think that's what he needs from you,” Inej replied, rather unhelpfully.

They had been walking for an hour and a half at that point. The buckwheat fields surrounding the country road had been harvested already and offered nothing better than the view of bare, reddish stalks in the purple sunset. The dry season and the clouds of dust that rose from the road were an enemy to Jesper's brand new tailored clothes.

Kaz was persuaded Ohval Saran was in fact the Disciple, the famed art thief who possessed the blade. He had devised a plan in which Zoya and Nina would tail her in the streets of Bhez Ju, while the rest of them would steal the sword from her house outside of town.

“But, I don't know what he wants!” Jesper carried on. “I've tried gifts and it spectacularly backfired. I've tried compliments, and he's having none of it. I've tried flirting, but I keep saying the most stupid shit…”

“Have you tried apologizing?”

“Apolog–.” Jesper stopped in the middle of the road again. “No. I haven't. Saints! I'm really terrible at this,” he realized. “I can apologize to him, and I will! I want to! But what if he doesn't hear me out? He keeps avoiding me!” By then, the others, including Kaz with his cane, had distanced them from at least fifty paces.

With a sigh, Inej went to him and brushed some more dust off the lapels of his coat. “He needs time. You have to be patient.”

Jesper frowned. “You know patience doesn't figure on the list of my otherwise numerous qualities.”

She patted him on the shoulder. “Yes, I know that.” She took his hand and tugged him along.

He followed her, an eyebrow raised. “This is usually the part where you give me a lecture in the form of a suli proverb.”

Inej didn't take the bait. “I think Wylan's more angry with himself than he is with you,” she observed. “He's ashamed, mostly, and also scared.”

He let go of her hand, self-conscious. “Scared of me?”

“I don't think so. Or, at least, not directly. I have this feeling that peering into Wylan's past wouldn't offer a pretty sight.” She kept walking, thoughtful. “He needs to know that you still care about him– that you value him despite knowing of his limitations.”

“But I don't give a flying fish that he can't read!” Jesper protested, kicking a rock and sending it rolling into the ditch.

“He does give one, though. It’s a big deal for him.”

Jesper slowed down, dragging his feet again. He heaved a long sigh. “Yeah, you're right.” Not so long ago, he had voiced his own, unjustified doubts concerning Wylan's skills as a demo man, and done so right to his face. He had asked for forgiveness since, but he still couldn't take those unfortunate words back, and that meant he'd have to accept a certain amount of distrust coming from Wylan. “I just don't know how to get him back, and it kills me a little,” he admitted.

“Love is not about possession; it’s about appreciation,” Inej said after a lengthy pause.

He mustered a smile. “Ah! I knew a proverb was coming.”

She laced her fingers with his once again, urging him along the dusty road. “Come on; let's catch up with the others.”

Ohval’s house was at the very end of the road. By the time they got there, night had fallen. A string of orange lanterns underneath the edge of the tiled roof guided them to the doorstep. Jesper thought of his father's old kaelish folktales, about evil spirits beaconing travelers to their doom with dancing lanterns. As any gambler, he allowed himself to be at least a little superstitious, and he knocked two times with his garnet ring on the handle of his right revolver to dispel bad luck.

“This house is traditional; it has a specific layout,” Tolya explained, tracing the shape of the successive courtyards and chambers with a stick in the gravelly sand.

“We sweep the entirety,” Kaz instructed, already pulling his lockpicking equipment out of his coat. “How long will it take you to set up?” he asked Wylan.

“I can have the door rigged with explosives in five minutes,” Wylan replied with confidence. “And if Ohval trips it, we have about two minutes before the firecrackers go off to get out.”

“Even if she returned prematurely, we can't leave without the blade,” Inej emphasized.

“Yes. The future of Ravka and my payment depend on it. I'm aware,” Kaz deadpanned.

“It's more than the future of Ravka at stake,” Tolya reminded everyone. “If we fail: Shu Han, Fjerda, Ketterdam, and beyond; they’ll all feel the weight of the Darkling bear down on them.”

“Way to up the stakes,” Jesper complained. He could always brush it off with sarcasm, but a ball of anxiety had already set at the base of his throat. From the corner of his eye, he saw the way Wylan shrunk in on himself ever-so-slightly as well, struck by the weight of this responsibility.

It took Kaz less than three minutes to pick the lock. Granted, he was a talented thief. And yet, a legendary one such as the Disciple would never leave their artifacts with so little protection. This job was too easy for Jesper’s comfort. He didn't even have to shoot anything so far. The ease with which Kaz picked the lock on the front door only accentuated Jesper’s sense of foreboding. He couldn't help but think they'd soon find a rusty nail in their slab of meat.

To everyone’s surprise, it’s Wylan who uttered the words. “No mourners.”

“No funeral” Inej, Jesper and Kaz replied in unison, before Kaz pushed the door open and they crossed the threshold.

As Tolya predicted, they found the first inner courtyard on the other side. It contained a pretty garden with flower bushes and a flagstone path crossing a bed of green moss; nothing that menacing so far.

Wylan put his satchel on the steps leading down to the garden, ready to set the tripwire.

Jesper stopped midway through the courtyard, hesitating. He removed his hat and tamed his hair. He was acutely aware that any job might be the last. Even tonight, things still might go terribly wrong. With high pay, came high risk. This might be his last opportunity to speak with Wylan; to make peace– make amends. Inej had prescribed patience, but could he even afford it?

He turned around and went back to where Wylan was kneeling.

“Listen, I'm sorry about what I said at the Dregs’ house,” Jesper blurted out. “I honestly didn't know you couldn't read. How could I know, when you're so clever and so smart?”

Wylan shot him a glare. “Could you just stop, please?!”

“With what?’'

“Patronizing me!”

“Hey,” Jesper said softly, with the tone he once used to appease frightened foals. He slid down the wall to sit in the stairs and be at Wylan’s eye level.

“Oh Wylan, it's amazing how you hold onto all those equations in your head,” Wylan said, repeating Jesper's words. “It's so clever, and so smart.”

What was the appropriate course of action here? Backpedaling? More contrition? At a loss of any other viable strategy, Jesper chose honesty and reassurance : “All I'm saying is that you've nothing to be ashamed of!”

Wylan's eyes narrowed with frustration. “You're trying to tell me how to feel about my shame, when you’re hiding the very thing that makes you special.”

Jesper smirked, seizing the opportunity to use a bit of his trademark, vainglorious humor. “My face? I would never–”

“I'm speaking about the fact you’re grisha,” Wylan cut him off.

Jespers face fell. It was as if someone had just dropped a block of ice in his stomach. Wylan knew. When did this happen? How?

“I've seen you shoot all those impossible shots! That piano wire didn't fix itself!” Wylan carried on with the same vehemence. “The thing I don't understand is why you're keeping it a big secret. You’re Zemini! Zemini think grisha powers are a blessing! So why are you hiding it?”

“Because it’s not a blessing. It’s a curse!” Jesper half-sobbed. Anger burned its way up his throat like a strong acid. He pointed a shaky finger at Wylan. “And you've no idea what it cost me.” Wylan might carry his own load of shame, but it didn't give him the right to probe at Jesper's wounds.

As if on cue, or exactly on purpose, Kaz called his name : “Jesper! We’re going in. Close the doors behind you.”

“I didn't mean to–” Wylan tried to explain, but tables were turned, and Jesper was the one to walk away. He was too upset to even spare Wylan a glance as he stepped into the next chamber.

It's at this precise moment that things turned from bad to worse. The two sets of doors on each side of the chamber slammed shut like a bear trap around an unsuspecting ankle.

The walls appeared to be made of rice paper paneling, which should have been easy enough to tear through. Inej pulled out her longest dagger and tried to stab it, but she couldn't even create a small dent in the tough material. “It's impenetrable!”

They were prisoners inside the very house they were trying to rob.
There it was ; the rusty nail.

With his cane, Kaz knocked on one of the beams supporting the roof. It made a low, clanking noise. Not Wood. “The beams are made of metal.”

“They're durast made,” Jesper realized. “Oh No! Oh shit! Wylan!” If Ohval was the Durast who fabrikated this prison, Wylan would never stand a chance against her. Jesper still had his hands over the door and he could feel the small science coursing through the structure, like static under his fingertips : more powerful than anything he had ever witnessed. Here, his own meager durast skills were useless.

“Wylan!” Jesper shouted, slamming his fists over the door, but it made no noise. It was like hitting a slice of bread.

“It's soundproofed; and he’s at the other end of the courtyard, busy setting explosives,” Tolya observed. “I don't think he can hear us.”

“What if Ohval comes back and finds him there on his own?” Jesper insisted. “She’d kill him in an instant.” He drew out his gun and shot at the lock. The bullet ricocheted and nearly hit him in the foot. What was he thinking ? Of course bullets wouldn't work either.

“Stop this, Jesper! I need to think!” Kaz barked out. “We're in more danger right now than your precious merchling!”

Jesper turned around to look at him. “What did you just say?”

Kaz didn't have time to clarify. An hourglass affixed to the wall suddenly spinned upside down, moved by a mechanism they could hear clicking inside the walls all around them. It was followed by an ominous hissing sound.

Jesper’s heartbeat set out in a frantic race against time. “That does not sound good.”

“There's something in the air,” Tolya pointed out, lifting his eyes to the ceiling.

A copper fixture in the shape of a five-petal flower was spitting an orange vapor like the mouth of a gargoyle. Kaz, who was the closest to the source, started coughing. The vapor was a sort of toxin; no doubt destined to kill whoever tried to steal the Disciple's precious relics.

“This is how we die!” Jesper lamented. Already, the poison was filling his lungs, burning his throat. His eyes watered. No! This couldn't be the end! He couldn't surrender, but his vision was darkening. His arms and legs felt numb and strange, as if ligatured. He wasn't sure how the floor found him, but suddenly, he had his cheek pressed to a solid surface.

Someone fell next to him.

Inej.

He recognized her long, dark hair, and tried to call out her name, but only emitted a muffled croak. He scrambled to find purchase onto the floor planking, in an effort to crawl toward her. His body weighed a ton. He was too weak. He would not be able to save her. They’d all die poisoned, just like his mother did, and he was powerless to stop it. He thought of his Da, who would think his only son had just dropped off the face of the earth, never to be seen again. All things considered, maybe it was for the best.

And that was it – the end. He regretted that the last exchange he had had with Wylan had been an angry one.

As his brain was shutting down, one single syllable kept flickering in the last sparks of his consciousness.

                        Why?

The only syllable that made sense, somehow.

                                                                                                    Wy…

***

Jesper was sure of two things: he had messed up; and was going to be stuck in that position for quite some time.

He was too high up to jump down safely, and too scared to do so anyway. He shouldn't have gotten so high without a plan as to how he'd come down.

He dangled his feet off the large branch, eyeing the void underneath them with a little shudder. That was the thing with trees; while you're still standing on firm ground, they look like wonderful ladders toward the clouds. But once you're up there, the ground threatens you with sprained ankles and broken legs. Not only was he stuck, but this wild cherry tree was beyond the jurda field most distant from the house, a hundred yards outside the limits of the area where he was allowed to play. Here, no fences kept the wild beasts at bay. He was right in the heart of the savanna, on their territory – the idea alone gave him a little thrill.

Jesper's parents allowed him to play on his own around the farm, as long as he stayed inside the fence, and reported back to the house every hour or so. Now, he was disobeying on two fronts : he was definitely outside the fence, and he had been stuck in that tree for more than an hour at that point.

He was getting antsy, and couldn't exactly move around, but he was still confident his parents would find him, at some point. He'd hear a shout of his name, and would shout back to guide them toward him. He’d probably be scolded for it, but he hoped his Mama and his Da would at least be a little impressed to see how high he had managed to climb on his own.

In the meantime, all he could do was to survey his surroundings. So far, he had seen a large group of antelopes crossing the grassland, heading toward the river further down the valley, and three wildebeest who had strayed from their herd. Breath caught in his throat when, in the late-afternoon sun, he spotted a pride of lions, at least seven of them. Maybe they had been there all along, napping in the high grass, but as the heat abated, they were starting to get more active, preparing to set out on a hunt.

In the cherry tree, Jesper was in relative safety, but he had no interest in them noticing him either, so he stayed very still as he observed them. The lionesses were further away, under a thorny acacia. But closer to him, Jesper had a clear view on two male lions, with splendid manes. They had been napping together, legs entwined, and now, one of them had started grooming the other, licking and nuzzling its face and neck, with affectionate, rumbling noises that sounded like gigantic purrs.

The sight awakened a strange interest and curiosity in Jesper, who slowly stood on the branch to see them better. He watched, fascinated, as the lions played lazily, rolling around in the dust; their large paws giving clawless swaps to the other's shoulders and torso. To Jesper's surprise, at some point, one mounted the other, and resumed grooming its companion's mane from that position.

As the heat dropped some more, the lionesses started circling the acacia tree, getting ready to move toward the bottom of the valley, where the prey gathered to drink. The two males followed the rest of the pride, rubbing shoulders and teasing each other with more harmless, playful bites.

“Jes !? Where are you?” At last: the sound of Da's voice.

“I'm here! I'm here!” Jesper shouted, when he caught a glimpse of his father's crimson shirt through the leaves.

“Jes?” Colm called again, once he reached the bottom of the tree, clueless as to why he couldn't see his son yet.

Jesper stifled a laugh. “Look up!”

“What in the Saints’ names are you doing up there?” Colm exclaimed, when he casted his eyes up and saw his son perched in the tree like a flycatcher bird. His Da looked more relieved than angry… at least for now, and maybe a little bit impressed too, or so Jesper hoped.

“I climbed, and I don't know how to get down,” Jesper explained.

Colm scratched his bearded chin. “Can you stand on the big branch there?” he asked, pointing at a solid foothold, about a meter down from where Jesper stood. “Then, you can jump, and I’ll be able to catch you.”

“O-Okay,” Jesper stuttered. Hugging the trunk with both arms, he carefully lowered himself, until his feet could find the bark on the bigger branch.

Colm extended his arms up. He could nearly touch his son's left shoe.

“I’m scared,” Jesper admitted with a small voice.

“Don't worry, coineanach. I've got you.”

Jesper took a deep breath and let him himself fall off the branch and into his father's waiting arms.

“You know you're not allowed to come here on your own, do you?” Colm scolded, as he put his son down on the ground.

“I know, Da. I'm sorry.” He wasn't that sorry, though, because he had seen the lions.

“ It can be dangerous. Next time you want to go and explore; tell me first, and I'll come with you.” When Jesper nodded in silent agreement, Colm offered his hand. “Let’s go home, shall we? Your mom cooked us dinner.”

They crossed the fence, the jurda field, and the vegetable garden. The farmhouse kitchen was basking in the last, golden light of the declining day. Aditi had already put flat bread, millet and a matoke plantain dish on the table. She was wearing an orange head scarf that rivaled the colors of the sunset outside.

His stomach grumbling, Jesper cleaned his hands in the water basin on the counter. He had built up quite an appetite during his stay in the cherry tree.

“I saw the lion pride earlier, mama,” Jesper said, sitting on his stool at the table. “From afar,” he specified, after having exchanged a quick glance with his father.

“Oh yes?” Aditi asked, setting a mug of strong, black tea in front of her husband. He thanked her with a kiss to her cheek.

“Yes. There were two male lions and I think they were confused,” Jesper added, biting into the flat bread.

“What makes you think that?” she asked.

“They were mating with each other.”

Colm choked in his sip of tea. He coughed and his wife patted his shoulder, sympathetic.

“Maybe nobody told them they can't make baby cubs together,” Jesper added, pensive.

Aditi filled her son's glass with cold water from their well. “They weren't trying to make babies, darling.”

“No? Then why were they rubbing against each other, then?” He had seen the ram do that sort of thing with the sheep ; same with the bull and the cows ; the stallion and the mares ; and babies always resulted from those actions.

“Because they liked each other very much, and it's their way to express their affection,” Aditi explained

“Oh,” Jesper whispered, and lost himself in thought for a bit, still thinking of what he had observed in the savanna that afternoon. Some of those things still intrigued him. “That's because they're adults, right?” He wasn't sure how that made sense, but it did to him anyway. And it seemed to make sense to his mother too, because she nodded slowly.

“Yes. Exactly.”

Colm had recovered from snorting some of his tea, and his fingers drummed on the table. Jesper knew, although he wasn't sure how, that this conversation had a weight to it. In any case, despite his earlier reaction, Colm wanted to contribute. “Some lions like lionesses, and some lions like other lions.”

“And some like both,” Aditi completed.

Jesper ate four spoonfuls of matoke before he spoke up again. “They looked happy; like they were really good friends,” he declared, “and would never get tired of being with each other.”

“That's what I hope for you too, my little lion,” Aditi said. She left a kiss on the top of Jesper’s head on her way to get more bread from the kitchen counter. “One day, when you're an adult too.”

Their discussion was interrupted by a loud banging on the door; urgent and insistent. When Aditi answered, two women from the village erupted in the small farmhouse, distressed, faces painted in tears.

“ It’s Leoni! She drank from old Egonu’s water well,” one of them cried, clinging to the sleeve of Aditi’s tunic in her desperation. “The fool should have condemned it a long time ago ; it’s full of lead. She’s very ill.”

Jesper knew Leoni from school. Even if they weren't friends, he was sorry to hear she was sick. It sounded more serious than the flu he had caught the previous winter, however.

“Please Aditi!,” the other woman begged in a wail. “Please save my little girl.”

Aditi squared her shoulders and nodded. “I’ll come and see what I can do.”

Colm intervened, panic in his gray eyes. He took his wife by the shoulders. “No. Adi! You can't do it! It's too risky! You’d be putting your own life in danger!!”

“Colm, if I don't do this she’s likely going to die,” she said, just as determined.

“What about our child!?” Colm shouted, pointing a trembling finger at Jesper, who stuck his head in his shoulders, feeling tears prickling the corner of his eyes. “What about him!!? What if something happens to you!!?”

“Wouldn't you be grateful if he was dying and someone at least tried to save him?” Aditi countered, calm and collected. She cupped her husband’s face and bore her gaze into his. “It’s not your decision to make, my love. It’s mine only.”

Colm shook his head. ”They've no right to ask that of you,” he said, his voice breaking. He was losing this battle.

Jesper had never seen his father so upset, and it made him want to run away, go to the barn and hug his favorite goat around the neck.

“Everything will be alright,” Aditi assured her husband with a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. “I’ll be back soon. Take care of our son in my absence.” She kissed him tenderly, and then went to kneel in front of the chair where Jesper sat.

“I love you, Jesper,” she simply said; not “little rabbit”, not “little lion”, not “petal” or any other familiar endearment she usually used with him. Not even “Jes”...she had just called him “Jesper”. This was how he knew this was different – bad – and he was terrified.

“I love you too, mama,” he said, throwing his arms around her neck, holding on tight, like he had done with the trunk of the cherry tree earlier. Once again, he was afraid to fall down if he let go.

She had to gently, but firmly disentangle from his grip. “Be good to your Da tonight, alright?” She left a last kiss to his forehead and she was gone, following the two weeping women into the night.

This was the last time Jesper saw his mother alive. Aditi Hilli would never get to see her son grow into an adult. Jesper learned that those he loved weren't meant to stay. Bonds couldn't last forever. In the end, people always vanished.

Chapter Text

It had never occured to Wylan that Jesper could feel shame. Everything about him exuded confidence ; from his choice of clothing, to his carefree gait, to the way he spoke, and fought and made love. And yet, Wylan had just been confronted to a crack in the facade ; a glimpse of perhaps the real Jesper underneath – insecure and bearing scars, just like him. In a sense, he found comfort in that. He felt less alone, less inferior.

Wylan was sitting in the stairs leading down into the courtyard garden of Ohval's house, his arms folded over his bent knees and his chin resting on top.

Jesper might have been careless with his words, but “I’ve been insensitive too”, Wylan realized. He had assumed being Grisha wasn't a good enough reason to be ashamed, just like Jesper had assumed his inability to read wasn't a shameful thing either. Perhaps his parents had given Jesper a hard time about being a Durast, just like Jan Van Eck had made Wylan’s life a living hell for being the way he was. Wylan had been dealt a defective brain at birth, just like Jesper hadn't chosen to be born with the little science coursing through his veins.

Of course he didn't want Jesper to feel shame, or guilt, but knowing that he had his own struggles gave Wylan hope. Perhaps, they could grow together, and they could heal alongside each other, and he wouldn't have to feel left behind by a Jesper who had it all figured out. But that meant they had to learn how to get through difficult conversations without rubbing salt in gaping wounds…provided that Jesper would still want to talk to him.

A burning sensation in his right calf was the tell-tale sign of an upcoming muscle cramp. Wylan stood and made a few steps in the garden to stretch his legs, hands locked behind his back.

He had reached the fifth stepping stone when an unexpected vision stopped him in his tracks. A butterfly with cerulean wings glided past him, across a ray of moonlight. “Hello,” Wylan greeted the extraordinary creature. “Look at you! You're the most stunning example of a cyan morpho.” Morphos were known to be day-flying, and seeing one at night like this was unusual, to say the least.

The butterfly crossed the courtyard and Wylan followed it to a flowerbed displaying a collection of bushes covered in bright orange flowers. He let out a soft gasp, in awe. “And you're pollinating a datura meloxia!” In fact, there were several other morphos already drinking the nectar offered by the opened corollas. They’d been attracted from tens of kilometers by the sweet and potent fragrance. Those plants and their blue visitors seemed to have leapt from the pages of the book on rare flowers his mom used to read him as a child.

“I cannot believe that I get to see this in my lifetime,” he marveled aloud, fidgeting with the collar of his shirt. He had never thought he’d be lucky enough to see a datura meloxia, let alone be there for its blooming time. Over the past century, they had been massively harvested in the wild, almost driving the species to extinction. Only a few specimens remained in well-guarded, private gardens. Not only was it a slow growing plant, taking decades to reach maturity, but it only flowered one single night every twenty years or so.

Wylan hugged himself with both arms. “And there's no one to bear witness,” he regretted. If only Jesper was there to see this… But would he even comprehend the significance of it? “Like he'd care,” Wylan scoffed. “Oh, you know, it's only the most perfect example of symbiosis,” he added, louder, as if there was a chance Jesper could hear him through several sets of doors.

He was being petty, and unfair. Maybe it was true that Jesper wouldn't be as taken with the spectacle as he was, but he'd be interested in what Wylan had to say about it. Because Jesper might not care about insects and plants the way he did, but he still cared about people : he cared about Inej and Poppy, and even Kaz. And he cared about Wylan, as astonishing as it might be. Jesper had missed his flute performance for a game of dice, but, in other instances, he had also shown himself to be an attentive lover. He had looked after Wylan, and protected him, in a way no one had before; not to recent memory anyway.

“The butterfly processes the deadly, poisonous nectar of the flower,” Wylan continued his lonesome lecture, “and pollinates the plant in return. They need each other to survive. It's like… a little love story of sorts.”

What was the point in Wylan witnessing this extraordinary event, if he had no one to share that moment with? He missed the warmth of Jesper's presence by his side; the radiance of it.

“Wylan.”

He looked around, startled. Who had said his name? It had been faint, muffled, almost inaudible. Had he imagined it? Were the butterflies speaking to him now? If that was the case, he definitely needed some sleep. An eerie feeling set at the pit of his stomach.

“Wylan!”

No, he definitely hadn't imagined it, and he recognized that voice.

“Tolya?” he called out, hurrying up to the door leading into the first chamber. Why was Tolya there? Shouldn't they all be investigating the rest of the house by now? Where was Jesper? He tried to pry the doors open, but they wouldn't budge, even if he pulled, and pulled, and bruised his fingers on them.

Tolya’s voice said something else on the other side, but Wylan only caught the last three words: “it's killing us.” His heart jumped in his throat. He hit the doors with his open palms, calling out their names. “Tolya!? Jesper!? Anyone!? Hello!?” He got no reply, which sent his heartbeat into a more painful frenzy. “Jesper!?” he called again, his voice an octave higher, hoping against hope that he'd hear the familiar voice give a response.

“What do I do? What do I do? What do I do?” Cold sweat ran down the back of his neck. He could not surrender to panic, or they’d all die.

“You're a genius, Wylan Hendriks,” Jesper had told him at the brewery only two days ago. If there was even a modicum of truth to those words, now was the time to prove it. Turning walls and locked doors into gaping holes was kind of his specialty, afterall.

He ran back to where he had left his satchel, emptied his money pouch and popped open the caps on the red phosphorus and potassium chlorate bottles. He had no time to precisely measure anything. He'd have to eyeball it – which was risky business. He'd only use a small dosage of each. He couldn't induce a big explosion, because Tolya or one of the Crows could be lying on the other side ; unconscious and unable to move out of the way.

He stuffed the end of a wick into the leather pouch, and grabbed a handful of clay from the flowerbed to stick his explosive package halfway up the door. His fingers were trembling so badly he had a hard time lighting a match to ignite the wick. When he finally managed, he retreated to the stairs and blocked his ears, bracing for the explosion…which didn't come.

The chemical reaction had been enough to blacken the tough material underneath, however, and Wylan reckoned it had weakened it enough for him to break it. He pulled a mallet out from the assortment of tools in his vest, but wasn't able to create a hole bigger than the size of his fists put together. Still, it gave him the opportunity to peer inside the chamber. He could see Kaz’s boots, the tip of his cane and the bottom of his long coat. He also caught a glimpse of Inej's dark braid of hair. They were both unconscious… or maybe worse. He couldn't see the others.

“Tolya! I'm here! Jesper!?” What if he was too late? “Jesper?!” he shouted again, praying that there was still something he could do ; that the argument in the garden wouldn’t be the last time he’d ever speak to him.

Suddenly, there was movement; Inej was stirring on the floor.

"You're alive!"

"We're dying,” she gasped, trying to crawl in his direction. “We've been poisoned."

"Throwing up or hallucinations?" He already suspected it would be the latter, based on the sickly sweet scent coming from inside the chamber.

“Hallucinations; some kind of orange vapor.”

Wylan looked at the flowering bush behind him. “The datura meloxia.” When absorbed in small doses, the datura extract could be used as a recreational drug, but half-a-drop too much and it would kill you in a matter of minutes. It would kill any living being, except… the morphos.

“Okay,” Wylan decided. He went back to the flowerbed and plucked the wings of one of the butterflies between his thumb and forefinger. The poor insect didn't put up much of a fight, drunk as it was on the sedative nectar. “Sorry,” he still apologized, before passing it through the hole in the door. “Eat it,” he urged Inej. “That might sound strange, but the poison doesn't kill them, so they might be the antidote.” She had already put the butterfly in her mouth and chewed it. She coughed as she swallowed it, and slid down against the door. Wylan feared he had made a terrible miscalculation, but then, she climbed back up to the hole

“Wylan! I need three more.”

When Wylan came back with another morpho, Inej made Tolya eat one first, and then ordered him to take care of Jesper while she’d try to revive Kaz.

Wylan passed two more butterflies through the door and then waited, wringing his hands to the point of pain, waiting to see if his insane plan would work, or if some of his friends were poisoned beyond saving.

“Jesper!!” he heard Tolya shout, as he tried to wake their sharpshooter. What if it was too late for him? What if Jesper never woke up? No. He had to survive. Wylan could not, and would not, accept another outcome.

But then, miraculously, he heard Tolya speak to him: “Welcome back from your nightmare.”

“Is this the nightmare part?” Jesper complained around his mouthful, clearly not approving the choice of snack.

Wylan’s knees buckled with relief. He felt lightheaded and groggy, all of a sudden. They were all safe, for now, even Kaz, who appeared mad to be alive.

“I owe you my life,” Tolya told Inej, but she hastened to correct him:

“It was Wylan. He saved us.”

“Wylan did?” Jesper exclaimed, voice still raspy from the ordeal. Why did he have to sound so surprised?

“You're welcome!” Wylan replied weakly.

Hesitant footsteps shuffled closer to the hole in the door, and a dark skinned hand appeared through it, reaching out. “Wy?”

“I'm here,” Wylan breathed, taking Jesper's hand in a whim and bringing it to his cheek, eager to feel the warm press of his skin.

Jesper chuckled. “Happy to see me, are you?”

“I'm just glad you're alive.” Right at this moment, their spat seemed insignificant. They still had issues that needed addressing, but for now, he was just so relieved to have Jesper on his feet, laughing, talking and breathing.

“How did you do it? How did you save us?” Jesper asked, when Wylan let go of his hand and he pulled it back inside.

“I figured out Ohval used toxic flowers in her garden to create the orange vapor,” he explained. “Since the butterflies are immune to the toxins, I deduced that their system contained an antidote of some kind.”

“Wait a minute, the thing Tolya just stuffed into my mouth was a butterfly?”

“Uh, yeah?”

“Disgusting!” Jesper stated, with more awe than actual disgust. “Disgusting, but utterly brilliant! You're a genius, Wylan Hendriks. You can't fault me for saying it anymore! Your big, beautiful brains saved us all. We would've died in here if it hadn't been for you.”

“Jesper! There's no time to waste,” Kaz called him to order. “Ohval is going to be back soon enough. We have to be prepared.”

Tolya squared his shoulders. “Alright, what's the plan?”

“Can you still feel a heartbeat somewhere in the house?”

He pricked up his ear. “Yes, but it's faint. South East corner.”

“She built all of this to protect that heart,” Kaz surmised, “along with another way to get to it.”

“Can we get out of that damn murder room before we do whatever you're planning?” Jesper suggested, already antsy.

“I don't think we can,” Inej pointed out.

Kaz stayed quiet for a beat, studying the chamber around them. “I agree. Once it's locked, only a powerful Durast like her can open it again.”

“Can't Wylan blow the door up?” Jesper asked.

“Not with all of you still in there. It's too dangerous,” Wylan said, his voice faint. His head was spinning, but he put that on the account of the stress abating.

Out of habit, no doubt, Jesper pulled one of his guns and Wylan heard him check the magazine to see how many bullets he had left. “What do we do, then?”

“We ambush her from the inside,” Kaz decided. “She doesn't know how many of us there are. Tolya, Jesper and I, we play dead, and Inej will surprise her by dropping from the ceiling.”

Wylan was getting drowsier by the minute, as if he had imbibed one too many ale, but he still wanted to contribute. “What about me?”

“You wait.”

“Wh– No! That’s not fair! I can help!“

“You don't need to sideline him, Kaz,” Jesper came to his defense.

“I'm not. He's already proven to be useful, even when he's not in the heart of the action. I need him to keep an eye out for Zoya and Nina, provided they're still alive.”

Wylan was about to voice his concern for Nina, but Inej beated him to it: “You think something might have happened to them?”

“If that poison chamber is any proof, I think Ohval might be more dangerous than she looks,” Kaz observed, impassive. He walked closer to the door to give Wylan his instructions. “Disarm your tripwire and wait for the others. Once they're there, and that Ohval has freed us from that chamber, you'll have all the room you need to explode whatever you see fit.”

Wylan nodded, grabbed his satchel right away, and set out to accomplish his otherwise simple mission.

Walking through the garden toward the house's main entrance proved more of a challenge than anticipated, however. His legs barely supported his weight. The blurry, orange lights of the lanterns danced in front of his eyes, as if the whole building was on fire. When he finally reached the door and his tripwire, he wasn't sure anymore which way was up and which was down; left or right. He looked for his cutters through the pockets in his vest, but the number of said pockets seemed to have quadrupled somehow. He pulled out a wrench and nearly dropped it, convinced he was holding a live scorpion instead. Then, it struck him :”it's the datura– I inhaled some of it when I was passing the butterflies through the door.” But it was too late for him now to go back and grab a butterfly for himself. By some miracle, he managed to disarm his contraption, just before his vision was engulfed in darkness.

He recognized the place ; he was in the warehouse district, next to a row of enormous silos where the Van Eck Enterprises kept the sugar they imported from the South Colonies. Wylan's father had brought him to visit the place three or four times during his teenage years, perhaps in the hope that seeing the scale of their trade would motivate him to want to inherit the business empire someday. Suffice to say it didn't have the desired effect. Motivation wasn't the missing ingredient to fix his inability to read.

“What am I doing here?” Wylan wondered, as he approached a one-story building tucked between silo number 6 and silo number 7. Something intangible compelled him to push the door eaten by rust and to step inside.

He wandered through a series of narrow, ill-lit corridors, with paint peeling from the walls like dead skin, until a voice with a subtle trace of Zemini accent beckoned him toward a room at the very back. “I don't know what you want from me,” Jesper's voice was saying, tinted with a kind of distress Wylan had never heard from him before.

Making sure to stay out of sight, Wylan walked along the wall and threw a look inside the bare, concrete room. A nasty nausea seized him.

Jesper was tied to a chair in the middle of it. He had a bloody nose and a split lip; his right eye was swollen shut, in a grim sort of wink that didn't have anything to do with his usual, charming ones. Around him, stood a collection of menacing silhouettes. Wylan recognized
several of his father's henchmen ; Miggson and Prior, but also Brouwer, Vos, and Dekker.

“Where is he??? Where's Wylan Van Eck?” Prior roared, before punching Jesper in the face, presumably not for the first time.

Wylan almost keeled over, pain spreading across his face, as if the punch had connected with his own jawline.

Jesper spat blood on the concrete floor, along with what looked like a broken tooth. “I've no idea who you're speaking about!” Blood mixed with saliva trickled down his chin, and Wylan wanted to cry.

“You lying barrel scum,” Prior growled. “Tell us everything you know, or I swear, you'll end up floating face down in the harbor.”

“I'll tell you nothing, because I don't know any Wylan Van Eck!”

Prior wouldn't accept this as an answer, of course, and all of a sudden, his fat hands were on Jesper's unprotected throat, crushing it. Behind the door, Wylan was choking too, from fear, powerlessness. He tried to scream, but no sound would come out of him.

Only when Jesper's face was starting to turn from red to a horrible, blue-gray tinge did Prior release the pressure and step back to assess the result of his handiwork. “And now? Does that refresh your memory a little bit?”

Jesper coughed, air wheezing in and out of his lungs. “I told you; you've got the wrong guy,” he rasped. “Let me go, for saints’ sake!”

As soon as he had managed those labored words, Prior pounced to strangle him again. He was digging his thumbs into his trachea now, cutting any air supply. He was going to kill Jesper – squeeze any lasting traces of life out of his body, then discard him like trash. This time, Wylan was able to force some movement through his limbs. He erupted into the torture chamber, screaming loud enough to split his lungs. “Stop this!! Leave him alone! It’s me. I’m Wylan Van Eck!” He fell onto his knees, putting himself at the mercy of his father's executioners. They could beat him. They could finish him like a rabid dog, but not Jesper….not Jesper…

The last thing he saw, before Miggson grabbed him, was the shock and betrayal on his lover’s face.

“Wylan?”

It wasn't Jesper's brown eyes looking at him anymore, but Nina's grey ones, staring at him from above, filled with concern. “What happened?” she asked. “Who’s Van Eck?”

“No one!” Wylan lied in an undignified croak.

Nina helped him get up on wobbly legs. “Are you alright?”

Zoya was standing nearby, a hard frown on her face.

“I’m fine!” Wylan insisted, dusting his coat. Apparently, he had breathed enough of the datura to hallucinate, but not enough for it to kill him. He could taste blood in his mouth. He must have bitten his cheek when he fell. “Where's Ohval, did you follow her here?” he fretted.

“Yes, but we lost sight of her upon arriving,” Zoya explained. “I think she has a secret entrance to the house.”

No matter how hard he tried to chase the horrible, hallucinatory nightmare from his mind, it was as if the images had been burned into his retina with hot iron ; Jesper panicking, struggling, choking. “The others are supposed to ambush her inside, but I have a bad feeling. I think Jes– I mean, all of them, they might be in danger right now.”

“At four against one?” Zoya asked, an eyebrow raised.

“Well, she almost killed me,” Nina reminded her.

“We have to go in!” Wylan insisted. “Now!” But he wouldn't wait to know whether they were on board with his plan. He had already gotten to his chemical supplies, and gathered the same components with which he had blown up the old Crow Club and the Slat. His head was killing him ; crushed in a vice, but he quickly measured enough of the ingredients he reckoned would be needed to blow up the door separating them from the next courtyard.

“Stay away!!” he ordered Nina and Zoya, before he lit the short wick and stuffed the explosive package through the hole in the door. He took cover into a stone alcove further along the wall. The whole house shook with the deflagration, sending dust and pieces of metal flying across the blast zone.

Zoya was the first one to run through the opening, Nina close behind her. Without thinking, his ears still ringing from the explosion, Wylan followed, unarmed and utterly unprepared to face whatever they'd find on the other side.

When he emerged into the next courtyard, his first reflex was to seek Jesper first, even before trying to identify potential threats. Their eyes met for a split second. He was alive. But then, the following second, an unbearable pain paralyzed Wylan's senses; like all of his bones were breaking at once inside his body – the marrow leaking out of them.

Ohval. It was her ; with her hands raised, using her little science as a weapon, on all of them at once, pulling the iron content from their blood. Soon, all their small vessels would explode under the pressure, then, it’d be the turn of the bigger veins and the arteries. From the corner of his eye, he saw Jesper’s face contorted with pain.

“At least we’ll die together,” Wylan thought, “and it won't be my fault.” What could be done against someone so powerful anyway?

And all of a sudden, the pressure released completely. Wylan doubled over, panting, as the pain receded about as quickly as it had come. It took him some long seconds to realize that it was Kaz who had put an end to it, by bringing in an old man in a wheelchair.

“There she is!” the old man cooed. “Sweetheart, we have visitors : art collectors from Kerch.”

“I know, dear,” Ohval replied, her voice sweet as rose water, as she stood amidst the evidence of a violent struggle and an explosion. “I was just about to offer them tea.”

If this was what politeness looked like in that country, Wylan wasn't sure he wanted to be invited to any tea party.

Obviously, Ohval was reluctant to kill seven people right in front of her husband, and perhaps, Kaz intervention was the only thing that could have saved them.

“These are the collectors I was telling you about,” Kaz told the old man, with an unsettling amiability. “They'll be pleasantly surprised to meet you, the great thief of the art world.”

Jesper snorted, skeptical. “This is the Disciple?”

He must have been a handsome, athletic man in his youth, but he was now crumbling under the weight of old age, and his gaze was somewhat absent.

Ohval turned to Tolya, dark eyes sending daggers his way, and she told him something in shu that had all the makings of a threat. Tolya replied in the same language, but the only word Wylan could make out was the name of the blade they were looking for. Apparently, the Disciple recognized the name too, because he perked up in his wheelchair at the sound of it. “The Neshynyer, I stole it for her!”

“Please dear,” Ohval tried to interrupt, before he could reveal too much.

“It was the last piece I stole before we decided I should retire,” he went on, despite her reservation. “Anyway. You couldn't really call it stealing. It was hers to begin with. She made it.”

“I'm sorry, did you say she made it?” Jesper repeated, taking upon himself to be the voice of everyone’s bafflement.

The Disciple stood from his chair and took a few staggering steps toward his wife, unsteady, like a child learning to walk. She received his hands into hers, her softness with him a stark contrast with the violence she displayed earlier.

“Hours of work, prayers and tears,” the Disciple recounted, “to fight the unkillable army created by the clock worker Kho.”

At once, they all understood they were not only in the presence of an incredibly powerful Durast, but of Sankta Neyar herself, the Saint who had fabrikated the blade.

Tolya was the first to kneel in respect, followed by Inej, but soon, all of them were on their knees, except for Kaz, to whom this would probably be a painful process, both for his leg, and for his pride.

“Come, my love. Let's get you to bed,” Ohval told her husband, guiding him back to his chair.

In a flash, Wylan saw himself, wrinkled and old, sitting in that wheelchair, while Jesper stood by his side, still looking young, fresh-faced, and as handsome as ever. This was the fate of those who wanted to love a Grisha. He wasn't quite sure what to make of it.

“This is our sanctuary, where we can sleep peacefully,” Sankta Neyar growled in Kaz’s direction, residual venom in her tone. “Somewhere we don't have to worry about thieves and bandits like you.”

“We're not bandits.”

She wrinkled her nose in disgust. “You're just a child, really.”

“A child who understood your weakness,” Kaz pointed out, his face showing about as much emotion as the one of a tombstone statue.

“Weakness,” she scoffed. “Four hundred years I've been alive. I've seen them all die: my family, all my loved ones. Taken away from me by time. Hundreds of years I closed my heart, as if that was the solution to ending all pain.” Her voice softened, as she looked at her husband, who was already dozing off. “What a safe way to live -- what a small way as well. You guard against joy; you guard against pain, but when you allow yourself to be blindsided by love ; two worlds become a universe.”

Wylan felt Jesper's eyes flicker in his direction. He gulped and stared straight ahead.

“He’s not my weakness ; he’s my universe,” she concluded. “What do I care about a blade?” Her gaze turned to Kaz. “What do you care about a blade?”

“The darkling has created an unkillable army,” he pressed her, “your sword is the only thing sharp enough to cut them down.”

“That sounds like Ravka's problem.”

“You think it'll be stopped by a line on a map?” Kaz snapped.

She blocked her husband’s ears and hissed: “I think I can still kill you where you stand before you can blink.”

Jesper was back on his feet, hands on his guns, and the others stood as well. Saint or not, she could still be a threat, not only to Kaz, but to all of them.

Tolya, however, still believed they could solve this without resorting to violence. “I've met the Sun Summoner who will take leadership in Ravka if the Darkling is gone. She's benevolent and she's also Shu,” he pleaded with her. “She could be the living bridge between our two countries, but that can only happen if you grant us use of the blade.”

Neyar scanned their faces, looking for any sign of deception. Not finding any, she just stared at them as if they had lost their collective mind. “Use of it? All of this just to borrow the blade?”

Kaz gestured toward the poison chamber, or, at least, what was left after Wylan's bomb tore through it. “All of this just to protect your husband in his sleep? We each fight for what matters most.”

We each fight for what matters most.

What was Wylan fighting for? What mattered most to him? His survival? His independence? His freedom? All of these were still valid, but as days went on, new reasons kept being added to the list…the main one was partial to a fashionable top hat.

***

A thick quilt of fog covered the buckwheat fields in the surrounding countryside.
In the timid first rays of the morning sun, one could barely make out the trees on the other end of the closest meadow. Out of sight, a solitary lark sang the first hymn of the day, soon joined by another. Wylan adjusted the straps of his satchel on his shoulders, pulled his leather coat around himself and shivered. He was cold, and staying there, motionless, outside the door of Ohval's house didn't help.

The saint had chased them all out of her home; all but Jesper. To everyone’s surprise, she specifically designated him as the one to whom she'd bestow the blade. Wylan figured she must have recognized him as a fellow Durast.

As they were all standing there, waiting, Zoya and Tolya debated the virtues of literary education for young grisha. Tolya maintained that it was necessary, and Zoya argumented that while it wasn't useless, combat skills were more important.

Standing beside Wylan, Nina seemed lost in thoughts, watching the sun rise through the fog. He wondered if she was thinking of Matthias, and whether she was thinking of him as often as he thought of Jesper.

He cleared his throat. “Nina? Can I ask you something?

She snapped out of her reverie and offered him a smile. “Of course, sweetheart.”

He gnawed at his thumb, hesitating, hoping his question wouldn't upset her. “How long have you and Matthias been together, before he was arrested and you were separated?”

She blinked, sadness veiling her eyes for a brief moment. “Sixteen days ; a little over two weeks.”

“What?” Zoya exclaimed, before Wylan could even react. “You decided to forsake your country and your loyalties for a guy you've known for sixteen days?”

“Listen! I think sixteen days is plenty enough to fall in love,” Nina defended herself, with a glare aimed at her former classmate. “And what Matthias and I have is genuine!”

Tolya wisely orientated the discussion toward a less slippery slope.

Wylan shivered again. “I’m going to start walking, okay? But I'll go slow,” he told Inej. “I just need to move.”

He set out down the path, across the mowed field. His fingers had been rendered numb by the cold and he tried to warm them by rubbing his hands and blowing on them. If Nina only had sixteen days with Matthias before declaring him the love of her life, why was he so afraid of giving Jesper his heart?

You guard against joy…

He was still scared to allow himself any shred of happiness, for fear it would be snatched away from him at the first opportunity, like a favorite toy to a misbehaving child. Wylan Van Eck had been a sad boy, but, maybe, Wylan Hendriks deserved to be a happy man…

“Wylan! Wait a sec!” he heard Jesper's voice calling out for him.

“Did you get it?” Wylan asked, referring to the blade and keeping his voice even, when Jesper caught up to him.

Jesper had an anxious divot between his eyebrows and his top hat was a little more askew than usual. “Yeah, I got it, and I got it, with like, kruge's dropped already and all that, and one day, I'll tell you everything,” he said, waving his hands as to illustrate his point. Wylan had no idea what he was speaking about, but he also knew of Jesper's tendency to ramble when he was nervous, so he patiently waited for him to clarify. “You were right. I need…” Jesper went on. “I don't want to hide who I am anymore, for a million reasons, including you.”

Me. Including me.

Wylan's heart warmed and swelled inside his chest, so light, like a cyan morpho taking flight. Heat rose to his cheeks, and he grinned to himself like a besotted schoolboy. Jesper still liked him. “You know, actually, I had a moment too, in that garden,” he admitted, pointing at the house behind them as they kept on walking. “I saw a datura meloxia. They are, like, extremely rare! When I saw it, all I wanted in the world was just tell you about it, and squeeze your hand.”

He had not even finished his sentence that Jesper had already laced his fingers with his. They stopped, facing each other.

“I want to stand with you in front of all the Deturma Ox things to come,” Jesper declared, both solemn and playful.

“Actually it's Deturma...uh... datura,” Wylan tried to correct him as a reflex, but then, the meaning of Jesper's words sunk in. Not only did Jesper want to be with him, he also wanted to stay with him for the foreseeable future; experience the world and its many wonders by his side. It was a huge step beyond “I don't want to make you any promises.” This was a promise; a commitment Jesper was ready to make, despite knowing of Wylan's most fundamental flaw. And now he was looking at him with a smile of anticipation, and it took Wylan another heartbeat to realize Jesper was waiting to be kissed. “Nevermind,” Wylan said under his breath, and he closed the distance between them.

Jesper's lips were plush and soft, and pleasantly moist, like the morning dew clinging to the grass around them. Wylan sighed into the kiss. It was over way too quickly, but thankfully, Jesper only broke it in order to pull him further into his arms. Wylan buried his face into the warm crook of his neck. He smelled of autumn leaves, and jurda, with lingering, sugary hints of the datura.

“It's good to be able to hold you again,” Jesper whispered in his ear.

“Yes. I agree,” Wylan said, his hands finding purchase on the kilt-cladded hips.

Jesper cuddling and kissing him was better than any other small joys Wylan had experienced so far; it was better than a day without reading lessons, better than playing his flute alone in the garden, better than the distant, fading memory of his mother's affection. Jesper was right here, right now, entirely.

Wylan pulled back to look at him again, just to make sure this was real, and not another wishful daydream, but Jesper took this as another invitation to kiss him. Wylan closed his eyes to savor it, too happy to surrender to the press of that perfect mouth. Jesper stroked his cheek, the metal of his rings tickling Wylan's five o’clock shadow. He melted into the touch, hands clutching Jesper's clothes, yearning for more already, but wanting to be tender and patient as well.

He was vaguely aware of Kaz and Inej passing by, and Kaz grumbling something behind his back, but he didn't pay it any heed. Only Jesper truly existed in that instant.

When they broke the kiss, Wylan snuggled even closer, locking his arms around his lover's waist and placing his head over his chest.

“Are you tired?” Jesper asked gently, rubbing his back under the satchel.

“To tell you the truth, I'm exhausted,” he admitted. He could probably fall asleep right there and then, on his feet, as long as Jesper kept touching and soothing him.

“When we'll be on the Hummingbird, we'll find somewhere you can lie down and rest,” Jesper suggested.

“Yes, please. I just… I just want to be close to you.”

“I'm not going anywhere, darling,” Jesper promised, kissing the top of his head, “but you’re gonna have to let go of me for now, though, if we want to be able to go back to the ship,” he pointed out with a chuckle, which rumbled through his chest and under Wylan's ear.

With a petulant groan, Wylan burrowed his face into the opened collar of his shirt, nuzzling the hollow of his throat, above the loose knot of his tie. “But I don't want to.”

Jesper laughed again. “I understand, but I can still hold your hand as we walk, if that can help?” he offered.

“I'd love that.”

***

“What's a parachute?” Wylan asked.

Tolya rubbed his chin. “Think of it as a lifesaver buoy, but for air travel.”

Jesper gestured at the pile of folded canvas on the Hummingbird's main deck. “We don't need the owner’s manual. All I wanted to know is if Wylan can lie on it to get some sleep.”

“I can't see why not,” Tolya declared with a shrug, “as long as you don't have anything sharp on you that could tear it.”

The ship was airborne already, which didn't cease to amaze Wylan. The craft was a feat of engineering like nothing he had ever witnessed before. It must have taken hours and hours of careful calculation, and very complex mathematical formulas just to make it lift from the ground. His brain, however, was too tired to try and figure it out.

According to Zoya, they had to fly for at least two hours before reaching the Volkvony, waiting for them out at sea. If Wylan could only have one of the two hours to rest, it would already be a blessing, and the pile of “parachutes” on the deck was perhaps not the best of mattresses known to man, but it still looked very inviting.

Jesper sat on top of it, his back to the ship's railing, patting his right thigh as an invitation to use it as a pillow.

“Oh Ghezen. I needed that,” Wylan said in a long exhale, as he lay onto his side, resting his head in Jesper's lap.

They stayed silent for several minutes, just listening to the wind bellowing through the sail above their head.

Across from them, at starboard, Tolya sat on a bench to read from one of his poetry books. Kaz stood alone at the stern, studying the horizon. Nina and Inej were giggling about something at the bow, while Zoya focused on keeping them all in the air. The irony wasn't lost on him, that he felt safer here, five hundred meters above ground, surrounded by rebels and criminals, than he ever did in the richest, most lavish and well-guarded mansion of the Geldstraat.

“Wy? Are you asleep?” Jesper asked, his fingers sneaking into his hair and nails teasing his scalp.

Wylan hummed. “Not yet.” He rolled onto his back and looked up at Jesper.

Jesper pensively threaded his fingers through the curls over Wylan’s forehead. “I wanted to tell you…I'm genuinely sorry about the book; the one I gave you at First Harbor. I can see now how me buying it could be interpreted as a condescending gesture. I assumed things about you and your life; about the way you felt, and I know I shouldn't have.”

Wylan sighed. “You meant well. I overreacted,” he admitted. “I was very harsh with you, and for that, I'm sorry too. You have a good heart, Jes. I don't want you to lose that just because I'm being weird about the things I can't do.”

“But… there are so many awe-inspiring things I know you can do,” Jesper pointed out, “and I'm sure there are many more I've yet to discover. I'm not thinking of myself as superior to you in any way just because I happen to be able to read and you can't.” His hand moved down to Wylan’s face and he stroked his cheek with the back of his fingers. The tenderness of it had Wylan’s heart ignite like a firework fuse. “I want to get to know you better, Wy,” Jesper confided. “You're right to remind me that this thing between us is still recent, and that there's still a lot we have to figure out, but I want to learn more about you, so we can build trust between us. I want us to have each other's back, but that means you must talk to me.”

“Yeah, I know. You're right.”
Jesper was asking him to stop running away at the first hint of discomfort or confrontation. This was going to be so hard. His instincts always told him to run ; run as fast as he could and never look back. “And I know you have good intentions, I’m just not used to people wanting to be kind to me, unless they’re paid to do so.”

Jesper raised his eyebrows. “Paid?”

Wylan cleared his throat, conscious he had said more than he should have.“I mean…unless they have an ulterior motive.”

“I see.” Jesper removed his hat and ran a hand through his own hair. He hesitated, clearly wanting to ask further questions. Instead, he put his hat aside and took a deep breath, like a councilman preparing to give a career-defining speech. “Well, I truly believe that you deserve kindness, friendship, and consideration.”

It was the first time anyone told him that, and a lump formed in Wylan’s throat. “Thank you, Jes. So do you.”

“I know,” Jesper replied, with a smile and a shrug, and his hand went back to its leisurely dance in Wylan's curls. “You should try and get a little bit of sleep now, Sunshine.”

“What about you?”

“I'll have my turn. Don't worry. Let me watch over you, and later, you'll do the same for me, yeah?”

“Alright,” Wylan said, and punctuated his approval with a long yawn. Slumber was already tugging at his eyelids.

…two worlds make a universe.

He wasn't sure if this applied to Jesper and he, exactly, but they were indeed two little pieces of chaos colliding, and, by some miracle, creating a space of peace and safety in the process.

***

The Hummingbird coupled back with the Volkvony about sixty kilometers off the coast of the North province of Shu Han, and Wylan was a tiny bit upset. “I thought you'd wake me up, so you could have your turn at sleeping!” he scolded Jesper, as the gunslinger extended his hand to help Wylan step over the ledge between the two, conjoined ships. “Instead, you let me sleep for the entire trip!”

Not showing any remorse for his actions, Jesper kissed Wylan's knuckles. “I’ll sleep later, when I deserve it,” he answered, a playful gleam in his chocolate eyes. Now that Wylan's feet were safely down on the Volkvony's deck, Jesper tugged on his hand, beaconing him toward the trap door that led below deck.

“Where are you bringing me, Jesper Fahey?” Wylan asked, suspicious and maybe just a tiny bit thrilled, as they climbed down the ladder and into the hull of the ship.

“Back at the Dregs club, I promised I'd drag you into a corner to have my wicked way with you the first chance I'd get,” Jesper reminded him with a wink.

The memory set Wylan's heart aflutter. “You did promise me that, yes.”

“I think I know of a corner. Follow me.” He guided Wylan a little further, to a sturdy wooden door, which, upon pushing it open, revealed a rather comfortable cabin with a large desk covered in nautical maps right at the center.

Wylan crossed his arms. “Really, Jesper? The captain’s cabin?”

“Well, he's not here to enjoy it right now, is he?”

With a deep sigh of surrender, Wylan entered the room and walked up to the desk. He made a show of trailing his fingers on the carved wood of the chair’s backrest. “ I suppose it wouldn't hurt anybody if we…borrowed it for a bit.”

Jesper’s smile widened into a wicked grin. “Precisely.” He put the lock on the door so they wouldn't get disturbed.

Wylan’s attention was attracted to another feature of the room. “And it has a nice daybed as well.” The mahogany piece of furniture was upholstered in blue velvet, and had three plush-looking cushions that would fit exquisitely in the curve of his lower back.

“Is it giving you ideas?”

“Perhaps…” He aimed a coy look at Jesper through his eyelashes; perhaps his best weapon. Jesper was far from immune to it, because he had already gotten rid of his belt and revolvers, along with his hat, dropping them carelessly onto the desk. His eyes detailed Wylan across the room as he advanced toward him; like a graceful panther on the prowl.

Wylan didn't mind being the prey; he relished in knowing he was the object of all this focused hunger.

Three seconds later, Jesper had reached his target, and backed him up to the nearest wall, erasing any space between their bodies and mouths.

Hands grasping at Jesper’s clothes, Wylan tried his best to keep some semblance of composure, but already, he was grinding his hips to his lover’s, desperate to feel that delightful bulge growing hard against his own pelvis.

After a long kiss, filled to the brim with pent-up desire and relieved frustration, Jesper broke it and rested his forehead to Wylan’s to confess : “I hope you know you had me pining like a fool these last two days.”

“You had me pining for weeks after our first meeting. I feel like this is justice.”

“So, our first night together left a lasting impression?”

Wylan nodded, staring at Jesper’s lips and licking his own. “Very much so.”

“It was mutual.”

And then, they were kissing again; heavy, passionate, and all-consuming. If he had any sense of self-preservation, Wylan would have been afraid of getting eaten alive, but these thoughts notoriously went out of the window when it came to Jesper. He'd let himself be devoured without putting up much of a fight.

Jesper's hand came wrapping around the column of his throat, in what should have been a sensual gesture, but a switch flipped in Wylan’s brain, and suddenly, Jesper's hand wasn't Jesper’s, but Prior's. Wylan made a strangled noise. Jesper mistook it for one of approval, and he increased the pressure slightly.

I’m going to die! They're killing me! I can't breathe! I can't– Animalistic panic exploded in Wylan’s brain and before he could even try to rationalize anything, he shoved Jesper away with all his strength.

Entirely caught off guard, Jesper tumbled backwards, air being knocked out of him when he met the floor in a disarray of long limbs.

They stared at each other, eyes wide…. with surprise and confusion, in Jesper's case, and fear in Wylan's.

“W-what happened?” Jesper stuttered, slowly getting back on his feet.

Wylan's fright morphed into burning guilt. Tongue-tied, he ran off to the door, and fumbled with the lock.

“No. Wylan! Wylan, please,” Jesper begged, catching up to him. “I know it's hard, but please don't shut me out. Let's talk this through together. Whatever it is, we can sort it out! Please! Let me help! ”

Fingers still trembling, Wylan let go of the lock. He rubbed his face with both hands. “Yes… yes you're right,” he conceded, voice shaky, pitiful. He could not run away anymore. He had promised himself he wouldn't. He had to trust Jesper.

When he turned around, Jesper stepped back to leave him more space. “Look! I'm not touching you,” he said, showing his hands in an effort to appease him, keeping his voice low and unthreatening. “I won't touch you unless you explicitly tell me it's fine to do so.”

Wylan nodded, but averted his eyes. “I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.”

“It's alright, I swear,” Jesper reassured him. “Take a deep breath; nice and slow.”

He had not even realized his breathing was so frantic, but after taking a few good, deep inhales under Jesper's guidance, Wylan was able to gather himself somewhat.

“So, you did not like me touching your throat,” Jesper remarked, detaching every word, as if Wylan was a wild horse that could bolt any second if he made too brisk a gesture. “Did it scare you?”

“Yes. It scared me.” Wylan was still staring at the floor. He couldn't look at Jesper; not yet.

“Okay...”

“It brought back really bad memories.”

“Do you want to speak about them: the bad memories?”

Wylan shook his head. “No. Not now. Maybe one day? I'm so sorry.”

“Don't be. I'm offering, but I'm not expecting you to do or say anything if you don't want to.”

“Thank you.” He dared lifting his eyes, and saw Jesper's troubled expression. “I didn't mean to upset you.”

Jesper stepped forward, but made no move to touch him, just as he promised. “I'm not angry with you. I'm angry at whomever thought it was within their right to treat you that way and not respect your boundaries. It won't happen again; not on my watch.” He must be assuming this was about a lover who had been a little too eager ; an erotic game gone wrong. The truth was far worse.

A long minute passed in silence, maybe even two. It's only when Wylan unfolded his hands that he realized they'd been balled into fists. His breathing and heartbeat had almost gone back to normal by now. He was glad he hadn't run away, and that he had allowed Jesper to comfort him. Otherwise, he would probably be curled up behind a barrel somewhere below deck right now, crying and hating himself for doing so.

Opening his arms, Jesper offered a tentative smile. “Can I give you a hug or is it too soon?”

“No, I'd love a hug.”

Jesper stayed put and let Wylan take the initiative to step into his waiting embrace. Wylan could almost feel Jesper vibrate with the need to hold him tighter, but he was applying self-restraint, not wanting to take the risk of making him feel trapped.

“So, hands on your throat is a no-no. Hands on the side of your neck are still okay?” Jesper asked in a whisper.

“Yes.”

Jesper's hand came resting, light and soft, to the side of his neck, and caressed the skin there, careful not to go anywhere near the throat.

“What about my lips?”

“They're fine. They're fine anywhere, really...”

“Oh? Are they?”

“Yes, very much so.”

“Should we put that to the test?”

Wylan shivered, and this time, it had nothing to do with the cold, or the fear. “Please.”

Jesper’s mouth found his cheekbones first, gracing it with barely a brush of lips. Wylan’s own mouth fell open in a soft exhale. He closed his eyes, letting the warmth of lust spread down his stomach, and induce a sweet stiffness between his legs. How did Jesper manage to arouse him like this with only a kiss on the cheek, mere minutes after he'd been scared out of his mind? Now, all he could think about was getting that sort of gentle attention everywhere on his body.

Then, Jesper’s practiced lips traveled to his jawline, and further down to his neck, the kisses growing increasingly heated. “How does this feel?” Jesper asked, with a smile in his voice that meant he knew exactly what kind of effect this had.

“Good. Feels good,” Wylan encouraged him, breath catching once again.

Jesper had loosened Wylan's tie, and now, his teeth were torturing the sensitive flesh at the junction between his neck and shoulder. “And this?”

Wylan tilted his head to the side to give him better access. He rested his back against the door as his legs threatened to give under him. “Even better...” He let out a low moan when Jesper gave a flick of tongue on an especially sensitive spot. His thoughts became less and less coherent, as desire was screaming louder than anything else. “Jes?”

“Yes, love?”

“I want you.”

“Saints, me too. You've no idea.”

They were throwing himself right into the jaws of war ; right into the Darkling's clutch, in what must currently be the most dangerous place in the world. Who knew how much time they still had to enjoy one another. Wylan would make each second count ; each touch, each kiss, each look.

Chapter Text

Still wearing his shirt and kilt, Jesper stepped back to admire his work ; namely Wylan’s current state of undress. With all that pale, marzipan skin utterly exposed, with blue velvet as a background bringing out the coppery hue of his curls, he looked like one of those nude paintings merchers bought for their private drawing rooms. Not that Jesper had ever gone to an art gallery in the Geldin District to feast his eyes on such paintings. Who would even do that?

His lover was a masterpiece, truly, and didn't even suspect the extent of his own beauty. And yet, Jesper knew that there was more to Wylan than his doe eyes and cherub’s lips ; a lot more than a pretty face; and that's what made his heart go wild.

Jesper removed his tie, tossed it over his shoulder, and unbuttoned his shirt in a slight hurry. Wylan was already trembling with need on the daybed, and he did not want to make him wait for too long. He let his suspenders fall and rest over his hips, and soon, his shirt followed the same way his tie did a moment earlier. When his hands found the straps of his kilt, Wylan stopped him. “Please keep it on,” he demanded, an enticing blush putting additional coloring to his already rosy cheeks.

“You like it?”

“I love it…”

“I should have figured out you were partial to a kilted man, when you dragged me into that alleyway next to the opera house the other day,” Jesper pointed out. “Speaking of which, I still have a debt to pay.”

“You don't have to. I wasn't expecting anything in return.”

“I know, but I want to spoil you.” He kneeled to the rug next to the daybed, finding himself at eye level with Wylan. “Consider me your humble servant,” Jesper said. His hands landed on Wylan's hip bones, careful and reverent. He leaned forward to trail kisses from his breastbone down to his sternum. “What would please that splendid body of yours?” he asked, whispering over the skin.

Wylan's breathing was already getting a little hectic. His hands roamed over the muscles of Jesper's shoulders as he considered. “I really like when you take me into your mouth and…when you… “

“When I suck you off?”

“Yes. It's just that… there is something I think I'd like even better. Something I'd want to try…”

“Oh? That sounds interesting. Tell me more.”

Wylan shook his head, his face turning crimson with embarrassment. “It's silly… stupid, even.”

“Is it something that makes you hard just to think about it?”

“Yes.”

“Then It's not silly or stupid and I want to hear everything about it.”

Wylan bit down his lower lip. “I don't know if I should–”

It wasn't like Wylan to be coy when it came to sex, so this intrigued Jesper even more. “Wy, sweetheart, I've been around the block a good number of times,” he reassured him, petting the slight dip of his waist. “Anything you throw at me I can handle. Chances are I'll be as much into it as you are. So please, tell me; I'm all ears.”

Wylan gulped. “I'd love–I'd like you to kiss me – it– kiss it gently, and slowly, take your time, like–”

“Like your cock is something precious that deserves to be worshiped?” Jesper completed softly.

Pupils blown wide, Wylan nodded. “Yes. Exactly. Exactly that.”

A languid smile spread on Jesper's lips as lust unfurled through him at the mere idea. “That sounds like a treat, doll. I'd love to do that to you.” It made sense now ; why Wylan had gotten so flustered. This was about intimacy; something beyond a simple need for bodily gratification.

“Yeah?”

“Oh yes,”Jesper assured him, starting at the base of the sternum again, and kissed his way down his stomach, only to stop under the navel to nuzzle the slight treasure trail. “And for the record, I think every inch of you is precious and deserves to be worshiped.”

Wylan's cock was a soft pink, and so very pretty, like the rest of him. It was going to be really difficult for Jesper not to draw it into his mouth to suck on it to his heart’s content, but he welcomed the ordeal. “Relax, beautiful. Let me give you all the attention you deserve.”

Panting in anticipation, Wylan did as asked, resting his head back against one of the velvet cushions, closing his eyes. His hands still scrambled for purchase on each side of the daybed, as if he'd fall over if he didn't close his fingers around something. He whimpered when Jesper gave a first, light kiss to the base of his cock. The next one was open-mouthed, and Jesper hummed into it. The skin was so silky under his lips. He did it again, a little higher along the pulsing vein. Then again, and again. He could tell his lover was already lost at sea, writhing and squirming, fighting against pleasure just as much as he accepted it.

“You're so sensitive, Wy,” Jesper marveled. “It's incredible.”

“I'm sorry– I'm–”

“Don't you dare be sorry. I adore seeing you like this. Please don't hold back.”

When Jesper reached the head, he had to fight the urge to wrap his lips around it, and push it to the very back of his throat. His heart was drumming in his ears, and his own erection twitched under his kilt. He suppressed his own needs in order to bestow adoring attention to the tip of Wylan's length, giving him the kisses he craved.

“Ahh, Jesper,” Wylan moaned, loud and unbridled, arching his back.

“That's the reaction I was hoping for,” he rejoiced, lifting his eyes to take in the sight of Wylan's feverish expression. He continued to please him in a similar fashion for several minutes, delighted by how something so simple could unravel him so thoroughly. “Can I lick you as well?” Jesper then asked. “Would little licks be too much?”

“No, I'd– I'd love that.”

“You're spoiling me.”

He licked a languid stripe, from the base to the tip, and collected the salty wetness leaking there. In the meantime, Wylan was white-knuckling the backrest and the base of the daybed, raptured noises escaping him in sync with the work of Jesper’s tongue.

After a while, Jesper reached his right hand up, touching his middle and ring fingers to Wylan’s lips. “Open up, my sweet darling.” Wylan eagerly obeyed and took Jesper’s fingers in his mouth, sucking lightly, coating them with saliva. “Would you mind parting your beautiful legs for me now?” Jesper then asked. “Yes, that's it,” he said, when Wylan spreaded his knees and lifted his hips to allow him to put a cushion under his back for better reach. Jesper pushed his spit slicked fingers between those round, inviting cheeks to meet with his entrance. Wylan gasped, tensed up, then relaxed with a long exhale.

Jesper proceeded to circle the tight muscle with his fingers as he kissed Wylan's cock, and then would rub gently when he gave licks, alternating between the two so Wylan could remain aware of the different sensations. Wylan’s chest heaved in rapid huffs, and he thrashed his head over the velvet of the daybed; the dual stimulation of Jesper’s mouth and fingers making him lose all control.

The involuntary stretch of his neck, the way he exposed himself with utter abandon, legs opened wide for Jesper, coupled with the earnest mewls that came out of his parted lips ; this all threatened to drive Jesper crazy to the point of no return. Wylan was going to ruin all other lovers for him if he kept behaving that way. “You're such a gorgeous man, Wy, but I think you're at your most stunning when you're in pleasure,” he complimented, but Wylan was too far gone to reply.

When he deemed Wylan ready to take just a bit more, he inserted his ring finger inside him to the second knuckle, no deeper. He wanted to keep the sensation light. He pulled it out, painfully slow and plunged it back, just as slowly, as his mouth kept on caressing Wylan's cock the way he wanted. He was rewarded by a series of loud, raspy moans.

Jesper would have loved to bury his face between those legs, drag his tongue around the finger that was half-way inside Wylan, but that would perhaps be too much. Wylan wanted something soft and tender, and he was happy to give him just that for now. He could always keep that neat trick for another time. Because there would be a next time. They'd both survive, and soon enough, he'd get to pamper that sweet porcelain doll again to celebrate their victory over the Darkling.

Jesper had managed to ignore the crying needs of his own body, in order to concentrate all his attention on his lover, but he was so hard by now; straining. Precum was wetting the leather under his kilt, and he felt he couldn't go on without at least a tiny bit of relief. “Do you mind if I touch myself?” he asked Wylan. “It won't interfere with anything. It's just that…. You look so perfect, and I love doing this to you, but it also makes me very aroused, and I fear I might die a little bit if I don't do something about it.”

“Of– of course,” was Wylan’s labored answer. “It’s just– It’s just a shame that– that I can't see it…”

“Another time, darling,” Jesper promised. “Next time, I’ll masturbate for you and you can watch me for as long as you want.” And he almost sobbed in relief when his fingers closed around himself at last. He bucked his hips forward, fucking his own fist six or seven times, just to take the edge off, before he focused on Wylan again.

Soon enough, Jesper started seeing clues that his efforts were bearing fruits. A thin, glistening sheen of sweat was covering Wylan’s stomach, along with goosebumps over his arms and chest. His nipples were hard and dark red; his balls firm and tight when Jesper ran his thumb across them. “You're getting close, aren't you, sweetheart?”

“I- I am,” Wylan confirmed.

“Do you want to come in my mouth? I won't suck hard. I will be gentle, I swear.”

Wylan was too worked up by now to resist the offer. “Yes…. please…”

He was teetering so close to the edge already that it took less than a minute of being wrapped in the wet heat of Jesper's mouth before he grabbed a handful of his hair and spilled down his tongue with a cry and a harsh stutter of his hips.

Jesper took everything he had to give, and released him, coaxing him down from the heights of pleasure with kisses to his thighs.

“Jes…. that was….that was incredible….” Wylan said, when he regained some of his wits. “Have you…? Did you…?”

“Not yet,” Jesper answered, when he understood what Wylan was trying to ask.

“Would you like to fuck my mouth?”

A shudder of desire coursed through Jesper’s spine. “Of course I would, but…you don't have to do that. This wasn't about me.”

“I know, but I want to,” Wylan insisted, repeating Jesper's earlier words.

“Are you sure?” With the negative trigger response Wylan had around his throat, Jesper was now hesitant to engage in something that could potentially imply even a slight choking sensation.

“I can take it. I want it,” Wylan assured him.

Much tempted, Jesper climbed onto the daybed and straddled his ribcage. He touched Wylan’s chin, tilting his head up so their eyes would meet. “Promise you'll stop me if this becomes too much, or if I go too deep for you.”

“I promise,” Wylan replied, sweet doe eyes all wide and innocent, as if he hadn't just uttered the most lewd proposition. “Would you please be so kind as to lift your kilt for me, so I can taste you?” The politeness was so contrasting with the nature of the demand that Jesper feared he might come undone on the spot.

Jesper did as asked, bunching the front of his kilt up at his navel with one hand, bracing himself on the headboard with the other. Wylan lowered himself between his legs. When he closed his fingers around the base of his cock, and guided the head past his lips, Jesper’s breath caught in his throat, his jaw went slack and he screwed his eyes shut with a guttural moan. The sensation was almost too much to bear. He had to go absolutely still for the span of a few heartbeats, just existing in the sweetness of that mouth, otherwise he just wouldn't be able to last long at all. One of Wylan’s hands grabbed his arse under his kilt, inviting him to go deeper and to move his hips, and it wasn't like Jesper had the mental fortitude to go against the unspoken order.

When Jesper started to move with a little more confidence, Wylan had the audacity to moan around his cock, as if this gave him as much pleasure as it did Jesper, which was absurd. Because Jesper had been thrown to the eight circle of heaven; a realm where Wylan’s angelic face and lips had been designed with Jesper’s deepest desires as a blueprint – as if they had been created to be penetrated and fucked by him, right here, right now, on that ridiculously luxurious daybed. Tidal waves of heat coursed through his legs, his groin, and up his back with every push, and every pull; the knot at the core of his stomach getting tighter and tighter.

His thrusts would have become uncoordinated and sloppy at some point, but Wylan wouldn't let that happen; he kept guiding him, setting the rhythm and the depth, and this kind of treatment pulled Jesper underwater. The strength of his grip could have torn the velvet up from the daybed as he trembled, legs almost giving under him from the power of his orgasm.

What happened afterward was a blur, but, when he became aware of his surroundings again, he was out of breath, utterly boneless, face pressed to a pale-skinned shoulder. Wylan was rubbing his back in soothing circles. “Are you still with us?” he asked with a small laugh, leaving a kiss at Jesper’s sweaty temple.

“Barely,” Jesper grunted in response, unwilling to move. “I think you just murdered me.”

“Rest in peace, then,” Wylan chuckled, his hand finding the nape of his neck and massaging the taut muscles there. “It’s your turn to sleep, treasure. You’ve earned it.”

“Wylan?”

“Hm?”

“I think it’s the first time you’re using an endearment for me.”

“Is it?”

“Yes, and it was an awfully kerch one, but I won't hold it against you.”

***

“I’m better with guns than I am with blades,” Jesper declared, crossing his arms and leaning sideways against the mast of the Volkvony. “I trust Inej more than I trust myself with carrying the sword.” Besides, he wouldn't want to deprive her from assisting Sankta Alina herself; she had accepted the job precisely for that purpose, afterall.

Tolya put his poetry book away and slinged his bag across his shoulder. “I have to find my sister, so I’ll stay on the ground.”

“We split into two parties, then,” Kaz decided. “Jesper, Nina and I, we’ll walk with Tolya to the fortress. Inej and Wylan, you’ll fly in the Hummingbird with Zoya to locate Starkov and give her the blade.”

Jesper straightened up, shoulders stiffening. “Why is Wylan going with them? Shouldn't he stay with us?”

Kaz's usual frown turned into a glare. “Now is not the time to be difficult, Jesper.”

“Why do we even have to split up anyway?” Jesper argued. “I thought the mission was to help Alina fight those shadow arseholes.”

“Yes, but Kirigan is also after the king. We have to keep him alive, if we want to get our money.”

That made sense; protect the king ; get paid. Jesper was on board with the general idea, but he did not like the prospect of being split apart from Wylan. If it was up to him, they’d all stay together, but he also understood how impractical it would be from a strategic standpoint.

Nina stood from where she was sitting on a barrel of fresh water. “I can switch with Wylan and go with Inej and Zoya instead,” she offered.

“I’d rather you come with us. We might need a heartrender,” Kaz pointed out.

On edge, Jesper twisted the ring around his middle finger. “But what if we need a chemist?”

Kaz’s hand tightened on the crow’s beak of his cane. “I’m not sure why you think this is up for debate,” he groaned.

“Come on, Brekker!” Nina threw herself in the melee. “Let Jes have Wylan. He’s already on the verge of freaking out!”

“I'm not freaking out!” Jesper exclaimed, with a little too much emphasis, which didn't help his case. “I'm being perfectly calm and sensible!” Trying to deny what a heartrender's powers could sense wasn't very wise.

Until now, Wylan had been standing in silence between Inej and Jesper, but he chose this moment to clear his throat, taking a step forward. “Maybe you could ask for my opinion, since I'm concerned?”

“Yes! Let’s hear him out,” Jesper agreed with a theatrical gesture, mimicking Mr Crimson, introducing the Grey Imp on stage for the final act of the Komedie Brute.

Kaz rolled his eyes, but stayed mute, curious to see where this was going.

As all gazes were on him, Wylan ran a self-conscious hand through his hair. “I think a demo man would be more useful and effective on the ground. I'd rather go with you, Kaz.”

“See!?” Jesper said in victory.

“Ghezen… fine!” Kaz relented. “Have it your way, but don't make me regret it, either of you,” he added with a glare, pointing a gloved forefinger at both Jesper and Wylan.

Half an hour later, the Volkvony anchored in a secluded cove, concealed by the dense ravkan forest and its centuries old pines. The wind was low and only a few, timid waves wrinkled the surface of the sea. Even the seabirds were quiet, hiding in cracks and nooks of the cliffside, as if bracing for something. “It's the calm before the storm,” Jesper thought, with a yawn of boredom rather than real fatigue. Still, he would have sold his soul for a coffee, with cream and just a splash of apple syrup. Ah. He missed Ketterdam already.

As half of their traveling party would soon take flight in the Hummingbird, and the other half would take a rowboat to reach the coast, now was the time for goodbyes.

Jesper went to Inej first, and dragged her into a tight hug. “Be careful out there, love,” he whispered in her dark hair. “Come back to us in one piece, yeah? We need you.”

“I think you're supposed to say ‘no mourners’,” she pointed out with a little smile, breaking the embrace but keeping her hands over his elbows.

“Maybe, but I still I needed to say this, for myself, and also for Lord Shark-eyes over there,” he pointed out, making a head gesture toward Kaz, who was standing in the shadow of the upper deck, silent and brooding, “cause he’s too emotionally constipated to tell you himself.”

She laughed gently, but did not comment. He squeezed her hand one last time before she walked away to the ship’s stern.

“Zenik,” Jesper acknowledged Nina with a bow of his head.

“Fahey,” she replied, in mock-formality, but then opened her arms and readily put them around his neck when he went to hug her.

“You'll look out for Nej, huh?” Jesper asked.

She stepped back and tilted her head to the side. “She doesn't need anyone to look out for her, but yeah, of course I will…if you promise to take care of Wylan.” She pinched her lips, as if wondering if she should stay quiet or speak her mind. Of course, she chose the latter. “That boy is very taken with you, you know.”

Jesper couldn't help but throw an anxious look in Wylan’s direction. Fortunately, he was too far away to hear this conversation. “I don't intend on hurting him.” At least not on purpose.

“We sometimes break hearts we never intended on breaking. Trust me on that,” she stated with a sour expression, folding her arms around herself. “Wylan’s brave, but he's also traumatized. I can tell by the way his heart jackrabbits anytime anything of consequence happens.”

Jesper rubbed the back of his neck. “I caught some glimpses of that too… At least, as much as he allows me. He’s quite secretive.”

“Perhaps with good reasons.”

“Perhaps with good reasons,” Jesper echoed with a sigh, his eyes seeking Wylan again. He was sitting on the deck further up toward the bow of the ship, frowning in concentration under his goggles as he mixed ingredients to prepare various types of bombs. “I'll do my best to look after him...”

“You better,” Nina said, patting his shoulder. She left Jesper there and joined Zoya who was already on board the Hummingbird with Inej, in preparation for the decoupling.

As Jesper stepped out of the way to let them take off, Nina's words followed in his footsteps. He knew, all in all, very little about Wylan's life prior to his involvement with Kaz, and even that was still somewhat shrouded in mystery. The way he had reacted when Jesper touched his throat, and the way he would constantly apologize for even existing; it reminded him of the way Inej used to flinch around him when she first joined the Crows. Wylan, like her, must have known a great deal of violence and coercion. Jesper wished his lover would trust him enough to confide in him, and it wasn't like Jesper would judge, even if Wylan revealed he had had to sell his body to survive at some point.

On the other hand, Wylan also seemed to have had quite a sheltered existence ; at least for a good part of his life. He didn't have the scarred and calloused hands of a Barrel brat who started working in factories or workshops at seven or eight. Neither did he have the tanned and sun-blemished skin of a farmer's son. Also, no Barrel brats or countryside boys played the piano like Wylan did. And there was that sentence he said ; “I'm not used to people being kind to me unless they're paid to do so…”

The Hummingbird lifted from the main deck, its propulsion engine buzzing like a determined swarm of bees. Jesper waved Inej goodbye, before the flying craft disappeared over the edge of the pine trees.

Wylan removed his goggles and secured them with great care into his satchel, along with the bombs. He hoisted the bag on his back, and when he approached Jesper, he leaned toward him, as if in conspiracy, and murmured : “I'm not one to gossip, and I might be wrong, but I think Kaz fancies Inej…” He made a chin gesture toward Kaz, who still had his eyes glued to the trees behind which the Hummingbird had disappeared a moment ago.

Jesper bursted out laughing. “Oh Wylan, you sweet spring sapling.”

“What? What did I say?

“Nothing. Come here,” Jesper said, and he wrapped his arm around Wylan's waist to pull him against his side.

“It's the way he looks at Inej when she’s hugging you,” Wylan whispered.

“Yeah, I noticed that too,” Jesper replied, as he buried his nose in Wylan's wispy curls. He smelled of black powder and something peppery. Poor Wylan, who thought he had just uncovered the scoop of the century. “But the more important question is : do you fancy me?”

Wylan pulled back to frown at him, vexed in a way that shouldn't be that adorable. “I was on my back for you less than twelve hours ago, Jesper,” he pointed out.

“That doesn't answer my question.”

He casted his eyes heavenward. “Ghezen help me! Yes, I do fancy you.”

“See? It wasn't that difficult, was it?” Jesper smiled down at Wylan and he dragged him into a kiss; perhaps the last one they'd be able to exchange for a while.

***

With his bad leg, Kaz couldn't tread this treacherous woodland terrain, littered with big blocks of limestone, as well as the others would. As a consequence, they all had to set their steps to his pace, so they wouldn't distance him too much. Being the fastest walker, Jesper forced himself to stay at the back, in an effort to keep their little flock together like some sort of reluctant shepherd.

Ever since Jesper and Wylan had had to peel themselves out of each other’s arms to get into the rowboat, the latter's mood had turned gloomy. Jesper wondered if Wylan hadn't been taking a page out of Kaz's book. Saints, that was a frightening thought! But the fact remained that their expressions were eerily matching right at this moment.

Kaz looked severe – more than usual. They had caught a few glimpses of the Hummingbird as they walked, flying ahead of them toward the fortress. Jesper wondered if Inej was on Kaz's mind, because she certainly was on Jesper’s.

The more progress they made, the more sickly the vegetation looked ; the trees had black sores on their bark, and the tips of their branches were twisted and rotten, like digits attacked by gangrene. It could only mean one thing ; they were approaching the Fold.

They reached the top of a bare hill, which gave them a good vantage point on the surrounding landscape: more hills, more fields and woods, and the fortress with its labyrinthine series of moats. Then, some three kilometers behind the stone battlements ; the dark horror of the Fold. The gigantic wall of shadows deprived the eye from seeking a reassuring horizon, and this was maybe one of the most unsettling aspects of it. It had been there for hundreds of years and yet, it still seemed…unnatural.

“Saints,” Jesper cursed, catching his breath with his hands on his hips. “I forgot how ugly that thing was.”

Saving the world, facing the forces of evil ; it was always more exciting and profitable than, let's say, learning to knit…not that he had anything against knitting. His dad knitted colorful scarves every winter and sent them to Jesper in the mail. They were warm and wonderful. But this kind of mission, unlike the art of turning yarn into clothes, had an appealing element of uncertainty to it, like throwing a dice. The consequences could be more dire, however, and the sight of the Fold was a stark reminder of that.

“Think of the money, Jesper,” Kaz advised.

By his side, Wylan had gone pale. “It doesn't matter, because we’re never going to get paid. We’re a bunch of idiots for even being here and we’re all going to die.”

Jesper snickered, and put one of his arms around Wylan’s shoulders. “See? That’s why I call him Sunshine,” he told the others, “his sunny dispositions and endless optimism.”

“It looks monstrous,” Wylan muttered under his breath.

“I've been inside it, and I can confirm. It is monstrous.”

“Are you not scared?”

Jesper threw a look at their surroundings and shrugged. “Nothing's threatening me as we speak. I'll be scared when it's time to get scared.” He rubbed Wylan’s arm. “Besides, I've no reason to be afraid, with such a talented demo man by my side at all times, huh?” This also meant ; “stay by my side, please, so I can protect you too.”

But Wylan did not reply. He lifted his head to follow the flight of a large murder of crows, going in the opposite direction to the Fold, fleeing the area like rats from a collapsing mine.

Kaz and Jesper exchanged a quick glance. Always trust a crow’s instinct. This couldn't be good. Jesper held Wylan a little tighter to his flank.

“What’s going on over there, Tolya?” Wylan asked, pointing at a column of smoke rising from a clearing downhill.

Tolya pulled a small spyglass from his bag and aimed it at the origin of the smoke. “It’s a crash site,” he announced with a shudder. “It’s Nikolai’s other flying craft. I think there are survivors though ; there’s a group of people running from it. They're retreating toward the fort.” He probably couldn't tell, from this far away, if his sister Tamar was amongst them.

“What happened to the ship?” Kaz asked, tension in his voice. If this flying craft had suffered such fate, so could the Hummingbird.

“I don't know. It’s like it’s been struck by fire.”

“Infernis can't throw fireballs that far up,” Jesper reminded Tolya, letting go of Wylan’s waist to close his fingers around the handles of his revolvers.

Wylan gasped, finger pointed at a stretch of burning trees further toward the fortress. “Look! There’s another fire!”

Tolya turned his spyglass in that direction. “I see a bunch of people in keftas; probably Grisha soldiers from Kirigan's army. That inferni just set a whole patch of woods ablaze. The Darkling must have found a way to amplify them.”

“They’re likely after the people from the crash site,” Kaz surmised. “The King must be amongst them.”

“What are we waiting for?” Jesper urged, eager to join the action. “Let's go!”

But just as he said those words, the earth trembled under their feet with a low rumbling. The ground roared like a beast nobody should have awakened. Kaz had to grip his cane and brace himself on a nearby boulder so as not to fall down.

The earthquake receded. Jesper, as well as the others, had all managed to stay on their feet. “What in the Saints’ name was that?” The rumbling noise, however, was still growing louder and louder.

“It’s the Fold,” Tolya shouted. “It’s moving!” And indeed, from the east, the Fold was advancing like a tsunami, engulfing forests, meadows and villages, and they all watched, powerless. The alarm sirens at the fortress were blaring when it disappeared into it as well. The Fold swallowed that distress call, then stopped, leaving only the moats free from its shadows. Jesper felt his heart tighten in his chest as he watched the Hummingbird fly straight into the darkness.

“Is now the time to get scared?” Wylan asked, struck by the vast horror of what they had just witnessed.

“Maybe it is,” Jesper conceded, taking his hand, “but we have to keep going.”

They hurried down the hill, and up the slope toward the fortress, as fast as Kaz’s leg allowed anyway. On the south end of a series of parallel moats stood several service buildings; storage houses and barns to shelter the livestock that fed the fort’s garrison. Tolya found a ladder, and they all climbed to a rooftop. They could hear the cries of first army soldiers being burned alive by the infernis, impaled with ice spikes by the tidemakers, or having their organs crushed to death by the heartrenders.

They hopped from roof to roof, until they found one on which Tolya could climb even higher up, on the side of a brick chimney. From there, he could see the battle raging.

“Kirigan's grisha have split up into two groups. I think they want to drive the survivors our way, and corner them here.” He jumped down from the chimney. “We should split up too. I’ll take care of the four grisha who went that way, and secure us a way out,” he suggested, pointing at the east end of the moat. “ In the meantime, you try and protect the king.”

“Alright,” Kaz agreed with a quick nod.

“Good luck, Tolya,” Wylan said, offering him a tense smile.

“You too, Wy,” he answered, squeezing Wylan's shoulder in a friendly gesture.

A protest formed on Jesper’s tongue. This was his nickname for Wylan, almost an endearment at that point, and to have someone else appropriating it felt strange and wrong. Tolya took his leave, climbing down along the gutter pipe, and Jesper swallowed that bout of possessiveness in order to concentrate on the task at hand. “What do we do now?” he asked Kaz. The sounds of gunshots and battle cries were getting closer. His fingers drummed on the triggers of his revolvers.

“We wait. Shouldn't be long.”

And indeed, only a minute later, a dozen men and women, wearing the first army uniforms, emerged around the corner. There were also two squallers in blue keftas among them, a brother and a sister, from the look of it, and also a shu woman wearing civilian clothes. Since they were fleeing Kirigan's grisha, one could safely assume they were on the king's side.

“Get down,” Kaz ordered. The Crows all dropped down on their stomach on the roof tiles, still able to follow the action over the ridge of the roof, but less likely to become direct targets.

Soon enough, the enemy grisha made their entrance. There were only three of them ; an inferni woman, a crazy-eyed tidemaker and a bald squaller man with a badly burned face. Despite their small number, they were attacking the soldiers and other survivors with incredibly powerful strikes, combining their powers to a deadly effect.

Wylan elbowed Jesper in the ribs with imploring eyes. “Jes! The inferni; she trapped them! They can't escape!” She had indeed sent a ball of fire right to the wrought-iron gate, the only exit out of this section of moat, effectively welding it shut.

“Don't look at me!” Jesper protested. “I can't do anything from here.”

Even Kaz was sensible to the dire position those people were in. “She’s going to finish them all,” he groaned.

“Hold on.” Wylan undid the straps of his satchel and pulled a bomb out of it. “I have this, but I can't throw it that far,” he exclaimed, waving it in Jesper's face.

“I can, though!”

“Okay. Be ready.” Wylan quickly ignited the wick with a match and passed it on to Jesper who sat up and made good use of his long arms and perfect aim to lob it over the iron gate. It fell right at the feet of the inferni woman. She had no time to react before the bomb exploded, sending her flying back with a violence that even Jesper hadn't anticipated.

The two other enemy grisha gathered around their fallen friend, giving a much needed respite to their opponents.

“Where did that come from?” someone shouted.

Kaz stood from his lying position. Jesper and Wylan imitated him. They walked up to the top of the roof, making their presence known.

“My demolition expert,” Kaz replied, loud and clear.

“Expert?” Wylan asked, surprised by the word choice and the praise behind it. Praises from Kaz Brekker were indeed as rare as true virgins in a brothel. Wylan squared his shoulders and straightened his spine. “I mean : yes, expert!” he repeated, so the people below could hear.

Jesper smiled, his chest swelling with pride. He was proud of Wylan for saving the day once again, and for acknowledging his own competence for a change. Moreover, he was proud to be Wylan's friend, and the man who’d get to hold him come the night.

The three of them climbed down the roof, aided by the presence of a cart with sturdy crates stacked just below the edge of it.

Jesper took the lead and went ahead to the iron gate to undo the welding on the lock. He concentrated his little science through the palm of his hands, feeling his way through the iron like the needle of a compass finding the north. The magnetic nature of iron made it easier. He created a breach between the metal particles, until the lock gave out and he could push the doors open. The sensation of using his powers, uncensored, out in the open; it set his heart pounding and sent a shiver down the whole length of his body. It was much akin to the excitement that seized him when betting a large sum on the spin of a Makker's wheel. With Wylan following close behind, and his revolvers in his hands, he felt like he could take on the world.

Kaz did not share his enthusiasm. “What kind of nightmare have we gotten ourselves into?”

The Crows took cover behind wood barricades, along with the few survivors from the grisha attack. Wylan and Jesper found themselves in the company of the shu woman and the two squallers, while Kaz hid behind another barricade alongside… wait a minute! Jesper recognized that blond hair and handsome face. The last time he had seen them, he was tied to a chair in the parlor of Dressen’s mercher mansion. This was the pirate who had given the Crows their last job in Ravka. “Why is Sturmond here?”

“Around here, he goes by Nikolai,” the shu warrior corrected.

The puzzle pieces fell into place. “Nikolai Lantsov. Of course.” Jesper twirled the revolvers in his hands with a smirk. “All this time ; close personal friend.”

She looked at him with her eyebrows drawn in confusion. “And you are?”

“You must be Tamar,” Wylan said. “We came with your brother.”

He was crouched down behind Jesper, his hand placed on his back, creating a patch of warmth seeping through his clothes. It was a silent way of saying “I'm here. I'm behind you,” and Jesper was grateful for the touch and the reassurance.

The two remaining grisha amplified by Kirigan had gathered themselves after the demise of their comrade, and were preparing to attack again and avenge her death. The tidemaker was already gathering the moisture from the air, turning it into a swirling vortex of water around her. With the help of the squaller, she'd soon be able to turn it into deadly shards of ice. Jesper knew he had to take the initiative before they could strike.

He threw a look at Wylan behind his shoulder.

Wylan gave the barest hint of a nod. “Do your thing. I have your back.”

Jesper took a deep breath, gave a flick of his thumb to the cylinder of his right revolver, sending it to a spin, cocked the hammer back and he stood and walked right into the enemy line of fire.

He shot four times at the tidemaker, but the squaller managed to shield her with a strong wind barrier that deflected the course of his bullets. This was quite annoying, so he made the squaller his new target. With his next shot, Jesper was able to get a bullet to graze the man's hand over the edge of his kefta’s sleeve. He recoiled in pain, leaving the tidemaker more vulnerable now. “Hello, gorgeous,” Jesper said, pointing his gun at her.

She lifted her fist to the sky, like brandishing a war flag, and instantly, Jesper’ revolvers got covered in blistering frost. He had to drop them with a groan. It was the second time in only a few days that people messed with his babies. Ohval had twisted his guns so badly that he had to spend hours painstakingly straightening them again so they'd be functional. He gritted his teeth. Now he was angry . 

“If only you’d been born grisha,” the tidemaker taunted him. “You'd know what it means–”

“To be blessed?” Perhaps this could truly be a blessing Instead of a curse, Jesper thought. Maybe he should see his own powers not as a threat, but as one more tool in his arsenal to defend Wylan, his friends and himself. 

Not taking the time to mourn the seams on his brand new waistcoat, Jesper tore five of his metal buttons one by one, throwing them toward the tidemaker at high velocity, each of them cutting through air like bullets and hitting their target with a nauseating sound of torn flesh. 

The tidemaker could only stare back, stunned. 

It's at this precise moment that the squaller man became a problem again. Pulling the static electricity from the air, he concentrated it in his hands, lightning bolts coursing between his palms. If he concentrated enough of it, this attack would be devastating. Jesper only had one button left. Someone else had to do something, and quickly.

“I have Datura Meloxia,” Wylan exclaimed, pulling a small vial from inside his coat. He must have collected it from the plants in Ohval’s garden while Jesper went to retrieve the blade. He would never cease to be impressed with Wylan's quick thinking and resourcefulness.

“Wylan! Now!” Kaz ordered.

“Air support!” Wylan called, and the two squallers siblings joined their effort to propel the cloud of datura pollen.

The cloud flew right into the enemy squaller’s eyes, nose and mouth. He let out a groan of pain, clawing at his face for a brief moment.

No one would ever know what kind of hallucination he saw, but he had a stupid smile on his face when Tamar's throwing ax split his skull. The man fell backwards, dead before he touched the ground.

As if suddenly shaken from her stupor, the tidemaker wailed in grief and rage, ready to unleash her wrath, but when she lifted her hand, her eyes almost bulged out of her head. All the fingers on her right hand were gone, cut clean by Jesper's buttons. Amplified or not, without her fingers, summoning would become a lot harder.

“You!” she bellowed at Jesper. “You're a–”

Jesper gave an insolent shrug. Yes. He was a durast. And for the first time, it felt good to be one.

She wouldn't have the opportunity to finish her sentence. One bullet from Nicolai's revolver lodged into her neck, at point-blank range, and she collapsed with an ugly gurgle from the blood filling her throat.

This had been brutal, and there was something cold and unforgiving in the king's eyes when he lowered his weapon. He had lost a lot of good soldiers : men and women, to the madness of this tidemaker. “It's over,” Nikolai said, holstering his gun, with a look of disgust for the corpse at his feet.

Jesper heaved a sigh, letting some of the tension leave his shoulders. The next thing he did was to retrieve the one of his revolvers that had fallen right at his feet. The other one was a little further, but Wylan had already hurried and picked it up.

“Thank you, Mpenzi,” Jesper said, when Wylan handed it to him. Wylan’s hands were freezing and trembling as they brushed against Jesper's, and his face displayed a worrisome, greenish tint. In his defense, they were all standing in a courtyard littered with dead bodies. This was bound to make him a little shaken. Jesper still made a mental note to keep an eye on him, to make sure he didn't go into nervous shock.

“Sister!” Tolya shouted in joy, appearing from between the storage buildings. When he reached Tamar, he lifted her in his arms and spun her around as she grunted in protest.

“The blade, did you find it?” Nikolai pressed Tolya and the Crows.

“Inej has it,” Kaz replied. “They've gone to find Alina and Mal.”

Nikolai gave a curt nod. “We have to do the same. If Kirigan brought the fight here, he's gunning for her.”

“I've cleared a way into the fort,” Tolya informed them all. “Come on.”

He led the way through the iron gate and between the labyrinth of buildings and moats, up to a narrow passageway between two sets of battlements, which led to the fortress’ west entrance.

Jesper looked over his shoulder, almost as a reflex, only to find out that Wylan was gone. A disagreeable mix of fear and puzzlement made its nest of thorns inside his chest. Wylan had been there, behind him, just seconds ago. He couldn't have evaporated into thin air. The others were already halfway down the passageway already. With a huff of frustration, Jesper went back, retracing his steps and finally spotted Wylan in the middle of the moat they had just left. He was standing over the corpse of the inferni woman.

“Wylan!” Jesper called, running up to him, but Wylan didn't react, frozen in place, until Jesper reached him and put a hand over his shoulder. Wylan jumped, like stung by a wasp. Cold sweat was pearling on his forehead. “She's dead,” he stated, his voice thin.

Jesper looked down at the inferni : at her ashen, waxy face, her muscles lax in an unnatural way, the coagulating blood around her nose, her mouth and her ears; her fixed, unseeing eyes with dilated pupils. It wasn't a pretty sight, it never was, but it still remained a familiar one to Jesper. “Yes she is.”

“I killed her.”

“Wylan, you have to come,” Jesper urged him. He doubted the others would wait for them. There was too much at stake.

“We have to bury her.”

“We don't have time for that,” Jesper insisted, squeezing his shoulder and trying to drag him away from the scene. Wylan wouldn't budge, though, like a block of limestone on a hilltop, as if he was hearing Jesper's plea, but that the words made no sense.

Then, Jesper understood what was going on. “It's your first kill, is it?” he asked, forcing his voice to gentleness, despite the urgency of the situation. “The first one you actually witness.”

Wylan nodded, lips sealed in a thin, distressed line.

Jesper did remember his first kill as well ; a loan shark enforcer he had had to shoot in self defense. He still remembered the wet cracking sound of the man’s skull when it met the pavement, and the sight of his brains scattered on the cobblestones, the blood gushing out of the hole Jesper’s bullet pierced between his eyes. You never forget the first life you take ; just like you never forget your first love.

“We can't unpack this now, love. We'll do that later, if you want. But now we have to run.”

“Maybe we shouldn't have done this,” Wylan regretted.

If gentleness didn't work, tough love still might. “Wylan! Look at me,” Jesper ordered. He grabbed both of Wylan's shoulders, making him turn away and toward him, then cupped his face between his hands, firmly, forcing the brown eyes to meet his own. “She was brainwashed and amplified by Kirigan. We didn't have a choice. You probably saved dozens of people by killing one.” He took Wylan's hand and tugged on it. “Come now. There’s nothing we can do for her, and I don't want anything happening to you. I wouldn't forgive myself.”

They ran out of the moats, through the passageway, and through the set of heavy doors leading into the fortress. They caught up with the rest of the group inside, in the first guard room, which was split in the middle by the black curtains of the Fold.

Jesper pulled a cartridge box out of his coat and reloaded his revolvers.

“We go in; we find Alina and Mal,” Nikolai reiterated. He was standing in an awkward pose, his left leg having sustained an injury during the battle outside.

“Here," Kaz offered, handing out his cane.

Jesper raised his eyebrows. Kaz had never offered him his cane, even that time when he had had to limp back to the Crow Club from a street fight against the Razor Gulls, with a bullet lodged in his calf. Granted, Jesper wasn't royalty, but still…

A similar kind of surprise showed on Nikolai's face. “Don't you need it?”

Kaz gave a subtle shrug. “I've more experience with pain.”

Nikolai accepted the offer, and Tolya beaconed everyone across the dreaded boundary between light and unfathomable darkness. “Follow me.”

Jesper held his breath as he stepped into the Fold. Breathing in that cursed air, polluted by merzost was like swallowing tar, or drinking water from the West Stave, downstream from the tannery and the reaper's barge hangar. Once inside, before your vision could get used to that environment, it felt like getting squid ink injected into your eyeballs.

There was enough of the gray, unsettling light typical of the Fold, however, and they were able to follow each other through the corridors inside the fort. On their way, they encountered several cadavers from first army soldiers- most of them gutted, others decapitated or missing limbs. The teeth marks that inflicted those mutilations were unmistakable ; volcra. Jesper gulped. He could have used Milo right now, but in the absence of a goat, he had a Wylan, and that had to count for something.

They turned a corner, and Jesper almost collided with Tamar, who had stopped dead in her tracks. He was about to ask what the matter was, when he saw the monstrous silhouettes of two volcra feeding on a corpse down the hallway.

The volcra turned their skeletal heads in their direction and growled. Too late ; they’d been spotted.

“In there!” Tolya shouted, ushering them toward a door to their right.

Jesper and Wylan entered first, then Kaz, Nikolai and the squallers. Tamar and Tolya went last, and slammed the door shut.

They had ended up in a chapel, with benches, a stone altar, and stained glass windows. Jesper removed his hat; a reflex long ingrained in his behavior by his father who always had great respect for the sanctity of such a place. The closest window represented the Sun Summoner ; a ravkan depiction of her, crafted before the world met Alina. Perhaps, they still stood a chance to survive this, if she rose to her saintly status and banished the Fold before the volcra got to them. Maybe, if Jesper cultivated his durast talents, he’d have a stained glass window to his image in a chapel somewhere, some day.

“Metal hinges, Jesper!” Wylan cried out, tearing him from his reverie.

Nikolai and the twins were straining to keep the door closed and the volcra at bay.

Jesper shoved his hat into Wylan’s hands. “Move!” he ordered, as he rushed to the door. He used his little science to weld the hinges and seal the door as tightly as he could, but the hinges weren't made of pure iron and the metal was resisting him in places. Nothing could make up now for his utter lack of practice.

“That should hold the volcra,” Tamar said once he was finished.

Jesper pulled a skeptical face. “We'll see.”

It wasn't like they'd be allowed to breathe and relax, or lower their guards, even for a second. Soon enough, a hissing sound filled the chapel as a black smoke rose from the floor in the middle of the room, taking a vaguely humanoid shape that kept on growing.

“What fresh hell is this now?” Jesper wondered, gritting his teeth.

“Everybody back,” Tamar ordered.

By now, the head of this horrible, menacing shape had almost reached the ceiling. It was made of pure shadow, an almost liquid sort, even denser than the one of the Fold surrounding them.

Jesper backed off toward the door he had just sealed shut, shielding Wylan with his own body.

“It’s Kirigan's shadow monster,” Kaz realized.

"Without the blade, how do we kill a shadow?" Wylan spluttered.

“All we have is this,” the squaller woman declared, and she combined her little science with her brother’s to summon a strong gust. It dispersed the shadows and the monster faded, but only for a short moment. Already, it had started regaining consistency.

Wylan pulled a small packet out of his satchel. “Shield your eyes!” he ordered, and everybody obeyed.

Despite the forearm he had thrown in front of his eyes, Jesper recognized the blue flash of a phosphorus bomb when it exploded at the feet of the nichevoya. This method proved more effective than the squall ; the creature evaporated entirely this time.

“Yes! My man!” Jesper shouted in victory, pumping his fist. Then, he saw the startled look on Wylan's face and realized the implications of what he had just thrown out in the open. “I mean, we haven't put a label on it yet, have we?” he tried to smooth things over. “Nevermind!” Jesper still boasted. “He did that!”

Wylan's method might have been more efficient, but the shadow monster would not be so easily vanquished. It only took half a minute before the hissing filled the space again and compact shadows rose from the ground once again. On the other side of the door, the volcra still growled. Jesper and the others found themselves caught between the frying pan and the fire.

Jesper shifted, putting himself between Wylan and the monster once again. What else could he do? Even if he emptied his cartridges into that creature, it wouldn't change a damn thing, and he told Wylan as much. “There's nothing I can do against it. You should hide under one of the benches.”

“Are you going to hide?” Wylan asked, as the nichevoya advanced toward them some more.

“No”

“Then, I'm not hiding either.”

Jesper let out a frustrated groan, not unlike the volcra's outside. “You're as stubborn as it gets!”

“My father would agree with you on this.”

The monster attacked Nikolai first, but the king was able to dodge it, despite his injuries. It made sense that Kirigan would want to wipe out the last of what was left of the Lantsov line. It was only a matter of time, though, before that thing would try to finish every last living being in that room.

The nichevoya went for Tolya next.

“Flash bomb!” Wylan shouted, throwing another phosphorus package in a valiant attempt to buy them all some time.

The monster vanished, and it seemed like this time, it took almost a minute longer to reappear. Maybe Wylan’s bomb truly weakened it, at least a little. But when it came back, the hissing sound was louder, and the creature appeared even more vindictive. It went straight for Wylan’s throat, but before the monster could reach him, Jesper dove and threw Wylan out of the way. They ended up on the floor. Wylan grabbed Jesper's shoulders and made them roll together until he was lying over him, under one of the chapel's benches.

“Well, if you wanted to be on top, you could have just asked, darling,” Jesper teased with a smirk. “I’m pretty versatile, you know.”

“Shut up,” Wylan ordered, not in the mood for pleasantries. A deafening bang came from over their heads. The nichevoya had located them, and was hitting the bench, trying to destroy it to get to his prey.

Jesper grabbed Wylan around the waist and made them roll on the floor some more, until they found themselves under another bench down the row.

“This brings back some good memories,” Jesper thought. He had Wylan underneath him now, just like when they had hidden to escape a shootout, under that rat catcher carriage on Bietstraat.

As he shielded Wylan's body with his own, he couldn't help but think that perhaps, he did want them to put a label on their relationship; perhaps he truly wanted Wylan to be his man. The idea alone gave him an additional thrill, as well as making him all warm and fuzzy inside. Could he be trusted with Wylan's heart, though? Even Nina seemed to doubt it. He had never been the most stable or dependable person ; Kaz could probably write a whole essay about that. But Jesper wanted to try… for Wylan. Wylan made him want to try to be better. Should he ask him to be his boyfriend? Right now? No. They were in the middle of a fight. The timing wasn't ideal, and Wylan wouldn't fail to point it out. For now, he should concentrate on keeping them both alive, or else, it would defeat his purpose quite a bit.

“Do you still have phosphorus bombs?” Jesper asked, as quietly as possible.

“Only one.”

“Better make clever use of it, then.”

By now, the hellish creature had figured out their new hiding spot, and instead of trying to shred the bench into wood chips, it simply tore it from the floor.

The next thing Jesper knew, he was lifted in the air from the back of his coat. The shadow monster slammed him, face first, against the nearest stone pillar. There was a definite cracking sound and pain seared through Jesper’s face– in the vicinity of his nose. “No, not my face,” he lamented. There was this incredible pressure in the middle of his back, right next to his spine, and he worried it would break it. The pressure morphed into a cold, flesh-tearing burn.

Then, a war cry came from behind him ; a roar of rage carried by Wylan's voice. “Let go of my man, you motherfucking arsehole!”

There was a blue flash of light, and the pressure released at once. Jesper fell to the chapel’s floor. His face was wet with blood, and some was getting into his mouth. He was scrambling back to his feet when his eyes met Wylan’s. “Wylan Hendriks! What on earth was that language?!” he chastised, a euphoric, half-crazy sort of laugh escaping from him.

“Wylan! Watch out!” Tolya warned, but it was too late. The nichevoya had materialized again, right behind Wylan, and with a powerful swing of its long arm, sent him flying across the room, like Wylan was no heavier than a twig.

Wylan landed in a pile of broken benches, crying out in pain.

As the monster set its absence of eyes on other targets, Jesper hurried to where Wylan had fallen, his heart thumping with worry.

He was grateful to find Wylan still conscious, and he leaned down to touch his face, careful. “Are you hurt?” Jesper asked. That was a stupid question. Of course he was hurt. “Can you feel your legs? Move your toes?”

“Ye-yes. I think I can,” Wylan stuttered, his breathing ragged and shallow.

“Hold on, love. I'm going to get us out of here.

“How?

“I don't know yet. I just will.

Wylan reached for Jesper’s face as well. “You’re bleeding.”

“I'm alright. I swear. Can you stand?”

But Wylan did not answer. Instead, his eyes grew wide. “Jesper… look!”

And all of a sudden, the room appeared to change. Blue tendrils of light were reaching in from outside the windows, furling and unfurling in a strange dance. Then, the sun rose, turning from blue to orange to yellow, flooding the chapel with brightness. Wylan was looking up toward the ceiling, in awe of this miracle despite the pain. Jesper wasn't; he was staring at Wylan's face instead.

Chapter Text

“Stop moving, Jes,” Wylan scolded.

“But it hurts!” Jesper whined in response, clearly tempted to bat Wylan's hand and the damp cloth away.

They were safe now. Sankta Alina had banished the Fold, but when the light had come back, it didn't put an end to the fight. The Nichevoya could still resume their attack in broad daylight. Jesper had kept defending Wylan, shielding him, and distracting the creature, trying to attract it away from Wylan, who was too weak to do anything. In those last moments of the fight, before the Darkling was finally defeated and the shadow monsters disappeared with him, the blood pouring down from Jesper's nose had gotten all over his face, mixing in with dust and grime from the rubble littering the destroyed chapel's interior. They were still sitting in the rubble, stunned and wounded.

Wylan could only empathize with Jesper, as his own body was battered and bruised, as if trampled by a herd of wild horses. He had broken ribs. He recognized the sensation all too well: the sharp pain that crushed his chest anytime he spoke or breathed. “You must let me clean your face so I can see if your nose is broken.”

“I hope not,” Jesper prayed. “That handsome face is one of my most important assets.”

“Please forgive me,” Wylan said with a deep frown.

“What for?”

“For not specifying that you should stay quiet as well as still,” Wylan groaned, then took Jesper's chin to keep him in place as he ran the cloth gingerly over his cheek where blood had coagulated, trapping wood splinters and other debris against the skin. That man just couldn't stop moving.

A small smile crept on Jesper's face. “Aren't you a little ray of sunshine, huh?”

“Shush!”

It morphed into a wide grin.

“And stop smiling too!”

The bridge of Jesper's nose was badly swollen, with a telltale bump in the middle of it. “It's broken,” Wylan concluded, “but we should be able to save your face, I reckon.”

Jesper lifted his eyes and hands to the painted ceiling in gratitude. “Thank the saints!”

With a low moan, Wylan leaned back against a broken bench, hugging his chest with both arms.

Immediately, Jesper shifted forward onto his knees and reached out, concern painted over his face, his hand landing carefully over Wylan's shoulder. “You're in pain too, Wy. You shouldn't have insisted on tending to me first.”

Wylan shook his head. “It's fine,” he croaked. At least, taking care of Jesper had distracted him for a few minutes.

Jesper took the bloodied rag and the bottle of purified water from Wylan, tossing the rag aside and putting the bottle back into the satchel lying nearby. “I'm pretty sure you have a couple broken ribs,” Jesper pointed out.

Wylan huffed and immediately regretted it when a stabbing pain shot through his chest. “It could have been way worse.”

“See? A little ray of sunshine,” Jesper quipped, trying to lighten the mood.

“I think I have broken ribs too,” the squaller woman sitting across the aisle confessed in turn.

Jesper winced and gave her a nod of compassion. “I'm sorry.” He reached for his top hat on the floor nearby and put it back on his head. “Given what we all just went through, it's a miracle none of us are dead,” he pointed out. “I'm Jesper, by the way. And this is my –” He threw Wylan a quick look. “This is Wylan.”

“Hi,” Wylan greeted, with a small wave of his hand, his other fist clenching the fabric of his shirt over his ribcage. He wondered what hurt the most in that instant ; his ribs or the sharp sting of Jesper not wanting to introduce Wylan as his anything. He could have sworn they were on the same page about this...

“Pleased to meet you both. I'm Nadia, and this is my brother Adrik,” the squaller said, introducing the man reclining against a stone pillar by her side. He looked utterly exhausted and barely acknowledged them, offering a weak, absent smile. One of his arms was missing, replaced by a fabrikator’s work. Wylan didn't know if the injury was recent or old, but he suspected that the current civil war had been brutal on many of the ravkan grisha. He swallowed down, thinking of the inferni he had killed and whose body was still lying in the moats : food for the scavengers.

As they were done patching up Nikolai the best they could, Tolya and Tamar shifted their attention to the other members of their party who needed corporalki help. Tamar went to comfort Nadia and Adrik as Tolya approached Wylan and Jesper. “I'm no healer, but I can probably numb pain and fix a few things,” he offered.

“Take care of Wylan first, please,” Jesper demanded, moving aside to leave Tolya some room to work. “He's got broken ribs, and my face can wait.”

Tolya nodded and kneeled down to the floor next to Wylan. “If it's just broken ribs or bruises, I'll be able to help, but if there's internal bleeding, punctured lungs, or anything more serious, we're going to need a real healer and quick.” He studied Wylan’s pallid face for an instant before asking: “Are you fine with me using my small science on you?”

Wylan hesitated. He never had grisha powers used on his body before. In the Barrel, a grisha healer certainly wasn't something he could afford, and whenever he'd accidentally hurt himself as a child, his father would always say that pain was necessary to forge character. Jan Van Eck had the same philosophy even when pain wasn't an accidental occurrence.

It was a little scary to have someone else's power enter his body, but Wylan trusted Tolya. “Yes, please.”

Tolya lowered his hands to the level of Wylan's sternum, joined his fore and middle fingers together, rotated his wrists in opposite directions, and separated his palm.

Wylan gasped at the intrusion as he felt a wave of foreign energy enter his chest, like a magnetic pull between his organs. He grabbed Jesper's forearm to steady himself. It wasn't painful, at least no more than what he was already feeling. It just felt odd.

“Your pulse is a little elevated,” Tolya commented after a few seconds, “but I think it's mostly the pain and shock. I don't feel bleeding inside your chest. You do have four fractures in your ribs on the left side, though. I'm gonna deal with the pain first, alright?”

Wylan nodded quickly. Yes. He wanted the pain gone, and to be able to breathe properly. He closed his eyes, feeling utterly drained and empty all of a sudden. “Thank you, Tolya,” he breathed.

Tolya worked on him for a couple more minutes. The pain receded gradually until it was only a vague, numb ache, but by the time Tolya was over, sweat was pearling on Wylan's neck and forehead.

“It's normal if you feel a little overheated,” Tolya commented. “Since I can't repair the bones themselves, I've boosted your metabolism so your body works faster at healing itself.” He risked a glance at Jesper. “I would still advise that you two refrain from getting too vigorous with each other for a couple days, if you know what I mean.”

Jesper scoffed. “I’ve no idea what you mean. I’m but an innocent lamb.” He still aimed a saucy wink at Wylan, which only served as negating the entire statement.

“Will you fix Jes too?” Wylan asked Tolya, only to distract everyone from the fact he was blushing right up to the root of his hair. Why did Jesper always have to be so shameless about everything?

“Of course I will,” Tolya reassured him, shifting to face Jesper, who straightened up on his knees and closed his eyes to let the heartrender work. Wylan watched as Tolya drained the swelling and bruising from Jesper’s nose.

Once he had done all he could, Tolya rubbed his hands together, as if to chase a tingling sensation from them. “It’s a good thing the bone wasn't displaced. I was able to do the same thing I’ve done with Wylan,” he told Jesper. “The bone will heal itself, if you leave it alone,” he added with a frown.

Jesper dismissed the concern with a wave of his hand. “Yeah, yeah I get it: no overly passionate kissing for a week!”

“Other than that you’re as good as new.”

“Awesome, thank you,” Jesper rejoiced, getting up on his feet. “Does anyone have a mirror?” he called out to the others in the chapel.

Kaz rolled his eyes, from where he was leaning against a table.

“Of course not, why would we have that?” Tamar said, squinting, and clearly questioning his priorities.

“Nevermind,” Jesper replied, spinning around to look at Wylan. “Wy? Do I still look like my usual, handsome self?”

Wylan couldn't help but bite back a smile. “Of course.”

“Good.” He leaned down to help Wylan get up on his feet as well. “Yours is the most important opinion there is on this matter.”

Wylan clung to Jesper's coat, unsteady and lightheaded at first, but Jesper held him until he could stand by himself.

“Let’s get out of here,” Kaz decided.

Jesper kept his arm around Wylan's shoulders as they walked out of the fortress and into the sunlit courtyard.

The radiant sun and beautiful weather contrasted awfully with the destruction that reigned there. The volcra had wreaked havoc. The small number of garrison soldiers that survived unscathed were already sorting the wounded from the dead, and aligning the bodies of those who were beyond helping along the slope of a defensive embankment. Wylan felt sick at the sight of all those mangled corpses.

“Are you okay?”Jesper asked.

“Mostly.”

“Do you wanna sit?” he offered, making a head gesture at a wood stool next to a water barrel.

Wylan nodded and followed Jesper’s suggestion, in order to give respite to his wobbly legs.

Tolya and Tamar helped Nikolai take a seat on another barrel. The king was still in bad shape despite their efforts, and perhaps, his injuries were too severe for the heartrenders to fix.

The king struck up a conversation with Kaz, to which Wylan did not pay much attention. He was looking up at Jesper, who was standing close to him like a bodyguard, fixing the sleeves on his shirt.

This was as good a moment as any to address the elephant in the room ; namely the fact they had both referred to one another as “their man”, which should be something significant in the evolution of their relationship. However, the words had been said in a moment of high intensity and action, when their lives were on the line, and now that the thrill of the fight was gone, Wylan still wanted, needed, to know that Jesper had meant it.

“Jes,” Wylan began, “perhaps we should speak about the thing we both said in the chapel earlier,” he prompted.

“What thing?” Something like reluctance flashed into Jesper’s eyes for a brief moment – so quick that Wylan wondered if he had imagined it. And why was Jesper playing dumb? He was too smart not to know what Wylan was referring to.

He was still fixing the buttons on his sleeves now, but it looked more like fidgeting. Wylan hesitated.. should he insist, or just let it go for now? Maybe the timing was not ideal.

Jesper lifted his eyes, looking at something further up the embankment, and his whole face lit up like a beacon. Wylan followed his gaze and his heart jolted in relief when he saw Inej and Nina walking toward them.

They were back. They were safe.

Inej stopped in her tracks as she got closer. Kaz had turned into a marble statue, stiff and immobile, staring at her like the rest of the universe had all converged into one single point. “He doesn't just fancy her. He’s in love; desperately in love,” Wylan realized. He thought that perhaps, Kaz was going to walk up to her, or say anything to indicate his obvious relief to see her alive and well, but he was frozen, transfixed, like hit by a spell, or a curse. It’s Jesper who jogged up and reached Inej first, shouting “saved!” with all the joy contained in his tall, lean body, as he spun her around in his arms.

When he put her down, she touched his face with infinite tenderness and Wylan’s heart stuttered at the sight. It wasn't jealousy. It was envy. Judging by the look on his face, Kaz probably shared the same sentiment. Wylan envied their bond. Inej was Jesper’s best friend ; like a sister. Wylan, on the other hand, wasn't anybody’s brother, or even cousin’s, and had barely been anyone’s son. It was only a recent thing for him to be someone’s friend. As for what he had with Jesper, he wasn't naive enough to think sex equated a relationship– in fact, he was experienced enough to know that it didn't. He wanted so badly for Jesper to love him, but did that mean that he was in love with Jesper? That was a question to which he had no answer yet. All he knew was how much he ached to belong.

“And Kirigan?” Nikolai asked Inej, tense in anticipation.

“Dead,” Inej confirmed. “Zoya is protecting the body. Alina wants it burnt.”

With a sigh, Nikolai stood. “Thank you,” he said, looking at all the Crows assembled there, including Wylan. “My country might have been sunk if you hadn't arrived…again.”

“We'll settle those thanks in gold,” Kaz affirmed, unmoved by the king's gratitude.

***

The funeral was held out in the sand dunes ; at the heart of what used to be the Fold. “The Unsea”, some of the soldiers already called it. A lot of maps would have to be redrawn.

The darkling’s body was burned on a pyre. Alina, Zoya, and a tailor named Genya lit the piled wood with torches. They were amongst the people still alive who had best known the Darkling and his cruelty; Genya bore visible scars from it.

The whole scene appeared to Wylan as something out of a very strange dream; the kind of dream that leaves you pondering, in the morning, if it had not, in fact, been a nightmare.

For a moment, as the flames went up and started consuming Kirigan’s clothes and flesh, Wylan envisioned his own father lying there in his stead, the fire devouring his black mercher coat and turning his sandy hair to ashes. Finality, relief, atonement, liberation … he wondered if those were the things Alina and the others felt in that instant, or if it was just the same sense of foreign emptiness as the one that seized Wylan at the thought.

As they were flying back to the fortress in the Hummingbird, Wylan studied Alina from afar. She wasn't how he had pictured her, but he still couldn't tell exactly what was different from the image he had forged in his mind. Perhaps he had imagined her like she’d appear in a stained glass window. In reality, however, she wasn't basked in a glow of glory, wearing her saintly status like a crown of light. She looked like a weary young woman who had endured hardship and whose future remained uncertain. And then there was Malyen Oretsev, the firebird, the hero who had sacrificed his life to get rid of the Fold. Wylan couldn't help but admire him. He doubted he would’ve had the same courage. And yet, the man had a faraway look in his eyes as he scrutinized the horizon, as if searching for a new purpose. Indeed, after saving the world, what more could there be? Something King Nikolai said during his speech at the funeral echoed again through Wylan’s thoughts : “It's a bit daunting isn't it, knowing where to go from here?”

Wylan turned his gaze to the horizon as well, but in the opposite direction, past the forest, off the coast and to the West. The question was worth asking for himself : what did the future have in store for Wylan Hendriks? In the last weeks, he had let the riptide drag him where he needed to go, tossed and pushed into one direction or another by Kaz’s schemes or Jesper’s whims. But what now? What was waiting for him in Ketterdam? A life of crime? Building bombs at Kaz's behest while keeping on hiding, hoping his father would never find him? Jan Van Eck was only forty-six. That meant he still had some forty more years ahead of him. That was a long time to stay hidden, and age would only make his father more paranoid : afraid Wylan would come out of the shadows to claim his inheritance. Jan would never rest until his unwanted son was dead, unless Wylan left Kerch and never came back.

Tearing his eyes from the ocean, Wylan looked over his shoulder at Jesper who was telling some funny anecdote to Nina, gesturing wildly as he recounted the events. Jesper was surfing the riptide, not wondering where it might bring him next. Wylan wished he could be that carefree.

***

As soon as everyone stepped down from the Hummingbird, Wylan took Jesper’s hand and tugged on it. “Jes? Can you come with me?”

“Sure!” Jesper replied. He let his lover drag him away, sporting an easy smile and an eyebrow cocked in curiosity. “If you’re bringing me to a dark corner to have your way with me, I'm definitely interested.”

“No,” Wylan stated, pulling him further across the courtyard.

Jesper's face fell. “Oh,” he breathed but kept following Wylan nonetheless until they emerged from inside the fortress and into the moats where the battle against the grisha had taken place a few hours before.

Some weary, sallow-faced soldiers were now cleaning the battlefield on this side of the fort ; taking the bodies of their fallen comrades away and piling them onto a cart. Another part of the garrison had gotten to the task of creating a cemetery outside the walls. Wylan had seen them digging graves and pits from the Hummingbird as it landed. As for the grisha enemies, their body would be disposed of in a common grave north of the battlements.

His throat tight in anguish, clenching his teeth almost to the point of pain, Wylan walked up to the body of the inferni his bomb had killed during the battle. She hadn't been moved yet. She lay on her back where she had fallen, eyes fixed toward the courtyard’s entrance, as if looking for a way out.

Wylan swallowed. “Is it true, what you said?” he managed to ask Jesper, who was standing at his side. “That I don't have to feel guilty?”

“I meant what I said,” Jesper confirmed in a low voice.

“I still took a life.” No amount of justifications would take away that simple fact.

Jesper's hand came resting over his shoulder and squeezed. “You did the right thing. You did a brave thing.”

This time, Wylan tore his gaze away and turned his head to look at him. “Will you help me bury her?”

Jesper gave a nod of his head. “Yes of course. Let me find some tools. Will you wait here for me?”

“Yes.”

As Jesper walked away, Wylan put down his satchel and sat down in the dirt next to the body, guarding it so the soldiers wouldn't take her away. That woman he had killed : she might have a family somewhere who would mourn her loss forever. Or maybe, she was just like him, with no one waiting for her return.

It took almost half an hour before Jesper showed up again, carrying a shovel and a pickaxe. “As expected, shovels are becoming a rare commodity around the fort, but I still managed to find one,” he commented, handing it out for Wylan, who stood up to take it. “I can loosen the soil with the pickaxe and you dig the grave,” Jesper offered, already removing his coat and hat. “Where do you want to bury her?”

“We could do it here : right beside where she fell.”

Jesper rolled up his sleeves. “Alright,” he agreed, and got to work right away.

Despite the gruesome nature of the task and the exhaustion gnawing at Wylan's bones, they were a good team, working silently but efficiently alongside each other. This, at least, gave Wylan a sense of purpose. He could not bring the grisha woman back to life : it was too late for that, but, at least, he could still do this for her. He could provide a last farewell to a stranger, something he couldn't even do for the one person he loved most in the world.

Wylan stopped digging and leaned against his shovel; his lungs burning and his back aching. It wasn't great for his fractured ribs either, but he welcomed the pain. “I wish I could've done this when my mom passed away,” he told Jesper, “but of course, that was not possible.” He was only eight years old back then, and besides, Marya Van Eck didn't need to have a grave dug since her coffin was simply placed into the family mausoleum at Saint-Hilde cemetery. He wasn't even sure why he had confided in Jesper about it. Simply, perhaps, to fill the silence between them. Now he almost regretted that these were the words that got out of his mouth.

Jesper tried to wipe sweat from his forehead, but ended up smearing dirt across his brow instead. “Your mother,” he began, careful but intrigued, “you told me she died, but you never told me how.”

Wylan's first reflex was to get defensive, and he shot the question back at Jesper. “You didn't tell me how yours did either.”

Jesper hesitated, gave two more blows of his pickaxe to an especially stubborn tree root, but he answered nonetheless. “My mother died because she was a durast, just like me. A girl from our village drank from a lead-poisoned well. My mom saved her, but since she had to draw the poison into her own body, she passed away as a result.”

It made more sense now ; Jesper's aversion toward using his small science in the light of day. “So… the thing you said about your powers being a curse’” Wylan deduced, “and what it cost you…”

Jesper nodded, and he looked away, resuming his digging.

Wylan wanted to go to him, take him in his arms, stroke his hair and rock him to his chest, to console the child in him whose distress he understood all too well. “I'm so sorry, Jes. I shouldn't have goaded you the way I did, back at Ohval's house.”

“It's alright,” Jesper said, shaking his head. He gave the compact soil another blow, then stopped and turned around to look at Wylan. “You didn't know. And besides, I think I needed to hear it.” His gaze softened. “I think it unlocked something in me. In fact, I should perhaps thank you.” He tilted his head to the side with a bittersweet smile. Wylan didn't feel he deserved any kind of smiles.

Wylan took a deep breath. “I don't know how my mother died.” He had vowed to be more open with his lover after all, and since Jesper had bared his flank, he felt he had to reciprocate.

“How is that possible?”

“It just… happened. One day she was alright, and the next, she was gone. I remember she showed me how to draw roses in her painting studio the day before. She looked healthy and in good spirits,” Wylan recollected, the memory still raw like a friction burn in his chest. “I was told she died of a sudden illness, something so violent that it killed her in a few hours. I didn't go to the funeral either: wasn't allowed. All I know is that she's in Saint-Hilde cemetery now. Sometimes I wonder…”

“You wonder what?” Jesper asked.

“Nothing. Nevermind.” He would not voice it, because even himself still had a hard time entertaining the possibility that his father might have done something to his mother that led to her sudden death. After all, Jan Van Eck had tried to kill him: his own son.

“Who raised you after she died?”

“My father.”

“Really?” Jesper’s pitch rised slightly in surprise. “I kind of thought he was never in the picture. You don't speak much about him…”

“Because there's nothing to say.” You're lying, Wylan.

“Does he know where you are?”

“No.”

Once again, Wylan wanted to shoot back at Jesper in self-defense. “Does your own father know where you are?” he almost asked. He doubted Mr. Fahey was aware his son had been in Shu Han and Ravka for the last few days, risking his life against angry saints, vindictive grisha, shadow monsters, and volcra.

Jesper loosened his already loose necktie. “Your father must miss you.”

“No,” Wylan repeated sharply. “I don't think he does.” I know for a fact he doesn’t.

Jesper put the pickaxe away, on the side of the pit, and crossed the distance separating him from Wylan. There was tenderness shrouded in concern in his earth-colored eyes. “Then, he's stupid. I would certainly miss that sweet face if I couldn't see it anymore. ” He cupped Wylan's jaw and ran his thumb over his cheekbone in an affectionate gesture. He chuckled, because of the dirt he had inadvertently smeared on Wylan's skin in the process. Jesper tried to wipe it away with the back of his fingers, but judging by the apologetic look on his face, he had only managed to make it worse.

“Could you pass me the pickaxe please?” Wylan asked, in hope of changing the subject, gesturing at his side of the grave. “There's that stubborn rock over there. Can't remove it.” Whether that rock actually existed or not was inconsequential.

Jesper let go of him and obliged.

Once they judged that the grave hole had reached about six feet deep, they got to the task of placing the inferni's body at the bottom of it. She was stiff, and hard to move – rigor mortis having rendered her muscles rigid, like a bird after it broke its neck crashing over a window. Then, they were both standing by the side of the grave, and Wylan wasn't sure what to do anymore. “Should we…say something?

“Hm. Well,” Jesper breathed, just as clueless.

“I don't even know what her name was.”

“Maybe we can just say farewell and fill the grave?”

Wylan nodded in silence and Jesper grabbed the spade.

***

The sun was low on the horizon and the afternoon was stretching into the evening when, with their tools on their shoulders, their coats and waistcoat in their arms, they left the moats and walked toward the stables where Jesper had found the spade and pickaxe. “There's a hayloft up there,” Jesper commented, when they entered the building. “ I've done a bit of reconnaissance earlier. I thought we could sleep up there tonight.”

Wylan hung the spade up on a nail protruding from a wall. “Something tells me it's not sleep you have in mind,” he observed. He would probably share in the sweet anticipation if he wasn't so tired.

“Can you blame me, when you walk around looking like that?” Jesper commented, giving Wylan an appreciative once-over.

One of the horses neighed, as if in agreement.

Looking down at his boots caked with mud and his dusty shirt, which had come half-unbuttoned during the digging, Wylan scoffed. “Dirty, hungry and tired?”

“Three things to which we can easily remedy, I'm sure,” Jesper reassured, and he slung an arm around Wylan’s shoulders as they walked out of the stables.

They had barely gotten back outside when they crossed paths with three men from the garrison. “Hey! You are the Kerch thieves who found the blade that killed the Darkling, right?” one of them, a tall, broad-shouldered man, hailed them. Judging by the badges on his uniform, he had to be an officer.

“Well, we're amongst them,” Jesper replied, unsure.

“You guys are heros,” the officer stated, shaking their hands and clapping their shoulders. Then, he assessed their dirty faces and clothes. “But heros who obviously need a good scrub. We're heading down to the river to wash. Come with us? We'll grab you clean uniforms on our way. ”

***

A shiver went down Wylan's spine when he tossed his pants further off up the riverbank and dipped his toes. The current came circling his ankles as he took one step further on the sharp slate stones of the riverbed. The water was icy, winter being around the corner, but this was his only option if he wanted to feel fresh again. Having just been in close proximity with so much death, the cleansing was welcomed. He just wished this was a hot bath in a private room, instead of a cold dip in a river under the eyes of fifteen other equally naked men.

As a reflex, he brought his arms around himself, in an effort to conceal as much as possible from view. He was still quite thin, from his life of near starvation in the Barrel, some could even say scrawny. Compared to the soldiers, he thought he looked more like a young teenager than a man.

Jesper didn't seem to feel anything of the sort; whether it was the cold or the shame. He had already emptied a bucket of the river's water over his head, and was busy chatting and laughing with the other men, as confident wearing absolutely nothing as he was with his bold fashion choices. He was telling them about the lavender soap Wylan had made and passing it around so they could try it too.

Wylan couldn't help but ogle his lover a little, far from indifferent to the way the sun bounced off the smooth brown skin of his back and caught in the water drops running down the length of it, or how the late afternoon shadows played on the lean muscles of his arms. He still sometimes couldn't believe that a man as attractive and confident as Jesper could want him, of all people. The degree to which Jesper was willing to commit, and how long he'd want Wylan before he'd deem him inadequate was the question still hanging in the balance, however.

“You look like you're about to freeze to death,” Jesper commented, making a beaconing gesture so Wylan would step further and deeper into the river. “Come. I'll wash your back and then you can do mine, so we don't have to stand in that creek for the rest of the day.”

***

They hung their shirts to dry inside the stables, on the ladder leading to the hayloft. They had washed them in the river with the lavender soap, and changed into the borrowed uniform pants and shirts.

Wylan cuffed the bottom of his pant legs as they were a tad too long for him. On the other hand, Jesper's were too short and stopped at his mid-calf. He still cut a dashing figure in the short coat and the belt that enhanced his trim waist. He flashed Wylan a knowing grin as they got back outside.

The cold shower and warm clothes had left a fresh and nice sensation over Wylan's skin, but his stomach was knotted with hunger in such a way that it reminded him of many lonely, desperate nights in the Barrel.

They went in search of the other Crows through the fortress and spotted Nina and Kaz near the gate leading inside the main courtyard. Nina walked up to Wylan with purpose and grabbed his hand: “Come!” she prompted him, already pulling him along. “There's food!”

Wylan threw a look at Jesper who offered him a smile. “You go ahead,” he assured him. “I have to talk with Kaz.”

To celebrate Sankta Alina’s role in bringing down the Fold, and to thank the garrison who had bravely fought against Kirigan’s grisha, the farmers from the villages around the fort had brought food. Families of villagers built fires in the courtyard and hung cauldrons over them. In those, they were cooking stew with meat, carrots, potatoes, leeks and other seasonal vegetables. It filled the whole fort with an incredible aroma that drew everyone down to the main courtyard.

Wylan had lost sight of Jesper, but he took upon himself to wait in line with Nina to get bowls of stew and thick slices of rye bread for him and his lover. Then, he set out in search of Jesper.

The hot stew burned Wylan’s fingers through the terracotta bowls, but he gritted his teeth and endured it, balancing the bowls, spoons and bread the best he could.

After a few minutes of circling the courtyard, he spotted Jesper behind a wood barricade, hunched over a pile of empty ammunition boxes used as a card table. He was engrossed in a game of Three Men Bramble against two ravkan soldiers. Kaz was standing nearby, leaning on his cane and watching the game unfold.

Wylan approached the trio of players. He threw a look over Jesper's shoulder and saw that his hand consisted in a two of clubs, a queen of spades and a three of diamonds. It did not bode well for him. He had less than a thirteen percent chance to win with a hand like this. He should probably fold and abandon this round, or else, he'd lose the sixty kruge he had piled on the table in front of him.

Wylan cleared his throat to catch his attention. “I've got us some food,” he announced when Jesper looked at him over his shoulder.

“Oh. That's very sweet of you, Wy.”

The soldiers playing opposite Jesper eyed Wylan incredulously.

“I thought that maybe we could eat together and have a chat?” he told Jesper, a feeling of embarrassment of unknown origin settling high in his chest. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

“Sure,” Jesper agreed, still making no move to stand, grab his hat or to abandon the game. “You can find a place to sit. I'll be with you in a minute.”

As Jesper turned back to assess his hand once more and plan his next move, Wylan gulped, the uneasiness sitting on his stomach turning bitter. He and Kaz exchanged a glance, and something glinted in the frost-blue eyes : Pity? An apology on Jesper's behalf? Wylan would never know. He was no better at reading Kaz Brekker than he was at reading a book. It was even worse when the book in question was written in code, contained a collection of complicated schemes and actively resisted being read by anyone.

Wylan carried the bowls and bread to a circle of makeshift benches, made with planks and upside-down horse feed buckets. He sat the bowls of stew on each side of him, and blew on his burning fingers to cool them. His stomach grumbled and twisted at the sight of the three women soldiers across from him, devouring their stew and dipping their bread in the rich, greasy broth.

He still had some hope that Jesper would be true to his word and join him soon, but minutes passed and Jesper failed to move from the card table.

Shoulders hunched, elbows on knees, he rested his chin in his hands. It was stupid of him, and quite selfish in fact, to expect that Jesper would want to spend every waking moment in his company. Just because they were having sex didn't mean they had to be attached at the hip.

However, the disappointment was made worse by the fact Wylan thought eating together would be a good opportunity for the two of them to discuss whether they wished to put any label on their relationship. He had been waiting for Jesper to bring it up, but he still hadn't, although he had had plenty of opportunity to do so. Perhaps, this was a sign that his lover wished to avoid discussing it altogether, and even regretted he had uttered the words in the first place.

“May I sit with you?” asked a voice.

Wylan lifted his head and was surprised to see Nikolai Lantsov standing there, mug of beer in hand.

“Of course, your highness,” Wylan agreed. He tried to scoot aside, but realized he was stuck between two bowls of stew.

“Ah, please; you can call me Nikolai,” the king replied with a wave of his hand and an easy smile, sitting down. “We've fought this battle alongside each other. We're brothers in arms now.”

Wylan forced a polite smile, still a little intimidated despite the man’s friendly demeanor.

“Wylan's your name, right?” Nikolai asked, although it was more of an affirmation than a question. “You're the Crows’ demolition expert, and a talented one, as I was able to see.”

“Hm. I suppose. Thank you. ”

Nikolai made a chin gesture to the bowl of stew still full to the brim, abandoned on the bench by Wylan's side. “You're not finding the food to your liking?”

“It smells delicious, and I'm sure it is,” Wylan hastened to assure him. He didn't want the king to think he was snubbing ravkan country cuisine. “I'm just waiting for my– I was waiting for Jesper,” he said under his breath, his eyes seeking the card table across the courtyard. The top hat was back on Jesper's head, but he was still focused on the game, with no sign of wanting to quit.

“I think your friend is otherwise occupied,” Nikolai observed, licking beer foam from his upper lip.

“It appears so.” The same bitter taste from earlier was back in Wylan's mouth.

“You should eat,” Nikolai encouraged him, taking a bowl and handing it out for him, “before it gets cold.”

“Probably,” Wylan conceded. His stomach groaned like a caged bear and his mouth watered when he lifted the spoon to his mouth and the smell of vegetables, meat and herbs filled his nostrils. His eyes almost rolled back into his skull with delight and relief when the food touched his tongue, releasing a whole array of aromas.

A satisfied grin spread on Nikolai's face. “See?”

Wylan devoured his stew as Nikolai calmly finished his beer. Then, he set his empty mug down on the ground between his boots. “Actually, Wylan, I must confess that me asking if I could sit with you was a calculated move.

Wylan wiped his lips and chin with his sleeve, ignoring all of the posh kerch etiquette that had been drilled into his skull from childhood. “How so?” he asked, curious, before attacking his thick slice of rye bread, polishing the broth at the bottom of his bowl with it.

“I have a ship – the Volkvony. You've sailed on it, actually. I used to be her captain,” Nikolai explained.

A wild blush overtook Wylan's face and he almost choke on his mouthful of bread. Wylan had assumed the ship belonged to the royal family, but he couldn't have guessed that the prince actually acted as her captain. If Nikolai was the captain, it meant that the private cabin was his cabin! That meant he and Jesper had performed oral sex on a daybed belonging to the king of Ravka!

Fortunately, it was getting dark and Nikolai didn't seem to notice Wylan's mortified expression, or chose to ignore it altogether as he continued. “But now, I have to retire from the privateer business, as I’m the only heir left to the lantsov crown. I was thinking of appointing Mal as the new captain, but he's going to need a crew of some brave, multitalented people to continue the work I’ve begun. I'm offering you a place on that ship, should you choose it.”

The proposition took Wylan aback and at first, he remained mute. He would have never guessed he'd be noticed for his skills, and by royalty, no less. He couldn't help but look in Jesper's direction, and at Kaz, who was still standing nearby.

“Unless, of course, there's some better motivation for you to go back to Ketterdam,” Nikolai observed, following his gaze. “Something tells me that no one is indispensable to Kaz Brekker, though.”

“I wouldn't be so sure about that,” Wylan countered. Kaz would certainly go to great lengths to keep Inej and Jesper. “But in any case, I'm not one of them.”

Nikolai rose to his feet. “The choice is yours,” he assured him, “but you could become a truly valued member of that crew. You could find purpose and be on the right side of law, if, perhaps, that’s a life that would appeal more to you.”

The awful thing was that Nikolai was right. “When do I have to give my answer?” Wylan heard himself say.

“Tomorrow at noon.”

“I'll…I’ll think about it.”

“Good lad,” the king said, patting Wylan's shoulder. “Enjoy the double ration,” he added, pointing at the bowl meant for Jesper. “You deserve it.”

As Jesper was still failing to join him, Wylan followed the advice, at least partially. He ate Jesper's bread, then, when an old beggar woman passed by, asking him for spare change, he gave her ten kruge and Jesper's stew, which seemed to make her even happier than the money. “May the Sun Summoner bless you,” she said, before walking away with the food.

It took twenty more minutes before Jesper appeared and let himself fall with a huff by Wylan’ side on the bench. “Saints! I have such rotten luck, I swear!” he complained. “I thought I would make at least a couple rubles! But nah… I've lost almost everything. I only have thirty kruge left. Good thing we’re going to get paid soon, and that the food here is free. Speaking of which, I thought you had gotten some stew?”

“Ate mine, and gave your portion to someone else,” Wylan informed him in a flat voice, making a point of staring straight ahead, at nothing in particular.

“But…I thought we were going to eat together.”

“Me too, but it’s been almost an hour, Jes!”

A brief, puzzled silence, and then: “Has it really been that long?”

“Yes.”

“You’re angry,” Jesper realized. He had this small crease in the middle of his forehead, like everytime he was upset.

“A little bit, I’m not going to lie,” Wylan admitted, eyebrows furrowed.

Jesper covered his face with both hands, shoulders falling. “Ghezen. I'm so sorry,” he muttered against the palms of his hands. He rubbed his face, then sought Wylan’s eyes. “It’s a problem! It has been a problem for a while, you know; the gambling. I always think I'm going to beat the odds , and then I lose, and I tell myself I won't play ever again, until I see another deck of cards and a few wallets ready to be emptied.” He spoke quickly now, gesturing, but not in a joyous or animated way like he usually would. He looked like a man struggling not to drown. “And I think that this time, it'll be different! That I just have to play one more time to retrieve everything I've lost! It's a bad habit. And I wish I could tell you that I'll be able to control it one day but… I'm not sure I even know how! This is why I don't know if it would be a good idea for us to make our relationship official.”

The last sentence took a sharp stab at Wylan's heart. “I… You make me confused, Jesper. You say you want me to open up to you ; that you'll be there for me. You tell me you want to stand with me, and hold my hand through the things to come. You call me your man, and now you want to back away? What did I do wrong?”

“You didn't do anything wrong, Wy. It’s me. I just… I just think you deserve better. You deserve someone you can always trust; who will never let you down no matter what. And I don't know if I can be that person.”

Wylan wasn't sure if he wanted to be touched, yet he didn't pull away when Jesper took his hands. “You don't know what I deserve! You don't know everything about me!”

Jesper squeezed, gentle but firm, as if he was afraid Wylan would sift between his fingers and run like quicksand. “I feel like I know enough, though. I know you’re brilliant and clever, but also kind, loyal, and brave. Nina was right. You deserve more than a gambling addict of dubious morals.”

“Nina!? What does she have to do with anything? And you don't get to decide whether I want to be with you or not! It’s my choice!”

“I've made you angry, and sad,” Jesper regretted, “and even if it wasn't my intention, I can't promise it won't happen again.”

“So you don't want me as your boyfriend…”

“It's not that. It’s about the things I've done ; things I'm not proud of and that have affected the lives of people I care about. I don't want that to happen to you as well.”

Wylan pulled his hands away from Jesper’s and rose to his feet, his movements brisk. His skin felt too sensitive. His breathing quickened. “We've all done things we're not proud of! It's no excuse!”

“Okay, listen, I want to have a do-over,” Jesper decided, in an effort to prevent a flight response. “Will you give me a second chance, just so we can talk about this? Do you want to come and sit with me again? I hear there’s dessert?”

“I'm not hungry anymore,” Wylan blurted out. His thoughts were piling on top of one another so quickly the tower they built threatened to fall over his head any second. He had sworn he would not run again, but this….this was too much.

He left Jesper there, crossed the courtyard in hurried strides, not looking back, and bolted through the first entrance he saw. He took a corridor inside the fortress, then took a turn left, then another. He didn't know where he was going ; just that he had to get away, and keep walking until he had a clearer head.

He ran up a set of stairs and went through an unlocked door.

He was greeted with cold wind and a bright night sky on the north battlements. The stars, like a million eyes, stared down at him, forcing him to a halt. He filled his lungs with the crisp night air and the frantic heartbeat in his ears receded. This allowed him to distinguish voices ; a conversation further ahead, just on the other side of the closest turret.

He thought he had recognized the female voice, and walked in this direction without thinking. As he got closer, the wind receded and he was able to catch a sentence. “If he's willing to help me, then I don't need more time to think about it. You can tell Mal I'm in.”
Wylan recognized Inej's voice.

“Very good,” a male voice replied ; Nikolai's.

This marked the end of their conversation, and the two of them went their separate ways. As she came around the turret, Inej got face to face with Wylan.

“Wylan!” she exclaimed, startled. Surprising the Wraith must be a pretty rare occurrence. No doubt she had been deep in thoughts not to notice his presence before she almost collided with him.

“I'm sorry,” he apologized.

“No harm done,” she reassured him, but then seemed hesitant. “Did you…hear any of it?”

“Enough to know you’re not coming back to Ketterdam,” Wylan confirmed, finding himself troubled by this knowledge. “I take that Kaz has no idea, and neither does Jesper.”

She rubbed the back of her neck. “I will tell them tomorrow. I promise. Just don’t tell Jes, please? He has to hear it from me.”

Wylan nodded in agreement, but couldn't help pointing out: “Jesper will be very upset.”
Inej was one of the few elements of constancy in Jesper's life. Wylan didn't doubt that losing her would destabilize him quite a bit.

Wind picked up and blew in her long dark hair, obscuring her face like a veil for an instant. “Yes, I know. I will miss him too, you’ve no idea.”

“Why do you leave, then?” Wylan asked. He didn't want to shame her for it, but he still felt that Jesper's heart needed protecting. It was hypocritical of him, of course. He was also considering joining the crew of the Volkvony. But Inej was Jesper’s best friend, whom he had known for years; she was more important to him than Wylan, who had truly appeared in Jesper's life less than three weeks ago at that point.

“My parents, my brother, I have to find out what happened to them, and the slavers who are responsible.”

Wylan heaved a deep sigh. “I understand.” If someone told him that somehow, somewhere, he could be reunited with his mother, he'd be ready to move oceans and mountains to find her. It didn't matter how many years had passed since the last time he had seen her. His mother was dead, though. He would never see her again, but Inej had a chance to find her family, so she had to take it.

Inej stepped forward and her hand cupped Wylan’s elbow gently. “I know it’ll be hard for Jes, even though he won't want to show it,” she said. “But it brings me comfort to know that, at least, he’s going to have you by his side.”

Wylan gulped around the lump of guilt forming in his throat.

“You’ll take care of him, huh?” she insisted. “You’ll make sure he doesn't get into too much trouble?”

“It’s Jesper we’re speaking about,” Wylan chuckled without humor. “You know I can't make that promise.” And Jesper's tendency to recklessness wasn't the only reason why he wanted to avoid giving his word.

“It was worth a try,” Inej replied with a knowing laugh of her own. Wylan shivered and she tugged on his sleeve. “Come, it’s getting cold. Let’s find a bonfire.”

As they were going back down the stairs inside the fortress, Wylan tried for an instant to entertain the idea that, maybe, he could ask Jesper to accompany them ; Inej and he, on the Volkvony, but he already suspected Jesper would not agree to take the sea for an unforeseeable amount of time. “I love the gamble of Barrel life,” he'd say. Jesper already envisioned them all back in the city, working alongside each other; the “charming rogues of Ketterdam” as he put it – the five Crows living their urban adventures together. Jesper lived and breathed Ketterdam; from its most grandiose show halls to its seediest pubs. It was home to Jesper, and he would follow Kaz back to the motherland, no matter what… with or without Wylan.

***

In the main courtyard, at least five of the cooking fires had been turned into proper bonfires where soldiers threw broken cart wheels and pieces of barrels and barricades. Around the biggest fire, right in the center, Inej and Wylan found the rest of the Crows, as well as Alina, Mal, Nikolai, the twins, Zoya and the squaller siblings, along with a few soldiers, including Jesper's gambling buddies. Vodka glass in hand, Jesper was carrying a quiet conversation with Tolya. He stopped talking and lifted his head, straightening up to attention when Wylan stepped into the large halo of light created by the bonfire.

Wylan found a seat opposite him, on the other side of the fire, next to Nina. She threw him a puzzled look, picking up on his erratic heartbeat and the intentional distance between him and his lover.

She sighed. “What has he done now?”

Wylan shook his head, unwilling to share it at that point.

Inej sat beside Kaz without a word.

Soon, as if Wylan and Inej's apparition had disrupted something, all of the conversation died and silence fell around the fire. Most of the people assembled there retreated into a pensive state, staring into the dancing flames. All one could hear was the clanking of the bucket above the water well, balancing in the wind and hitting the stones on the edge of it.

“This feels like a funeral, and we had enough of those today,” Nina declared after a while. “Isn't there anyone who could provide anything as far as entertainment goes? I'd even take poetry at that point!” she stated, gesturing at Tolya.

“Well, if you insist,” Tolya rejoiced, stepping up on his feet and retrieving his poetry book inside his vest. For a change, no one stopped him from reciting Rabinov's Canto XVII in its entirety.

Then, one of the soldiers pulled out a harmonica, and Wylan let himself be lulled to a calmer state by the wistful melody. Harmonica was a unique instrument in that it utilized both the inhale and exhale. The sound of it always appeased him.

When the song ended, silence fell once more over the courtyard, as the other groups around the bonfires had also stopped talking to enjoy the music.

Overhead, a nighthawk hunting for moths flapped its wings and whined in the night.

Expecting another act to carry on the improvised recital, the Crows and Tolya all turned their attention to Wylan and the satchel resting in his lap. He clutched at it, heartbeat picking up pace once more. He missed the sensation of holding his flute, blowing in it and hearing music being born from the play of his fingers, but performing in front of a saint, a king and the bastard of the Barrel was bound to give him the jitters.

He threw a panicked look at his lover, although he wasn't sure if Jesper would be willing to help or even how he could come to his rescue.

Jesper stood, removed his hat just long enough to smooth his hair back and he cleared his throat. “I might have a song to offer,” he said, grabbing his vodka glass from the bench behind him. Everyone, including Wylan, looked up at him in surprise ; everyone but Inej and Kaz, in fact. Wylan suspected he was about to learn yet another thing about Jesper Fahey. “It's a kaelish-kerch song. In Ketterdam, it’s a tradition that someone volunteers to sing it at the end of a céilí, to ‘close’ the night off before everyone goes home,” Jesper explained.

Wylan's eyes widened, still in disbelief. Would Jesper actually sing ? Not missing a beat, however, Jesper straightened his shoulders, took a sip of vodka and cleared his throat again before he really did start singing.

Of all the money that e'er I had

I spent it in good company

And all the harm that e'er I've done

Alas! It was to none but me

Jesper didn't have any singing technique ; clearly never had any lessons, but he had a good ear and as soon as the first notes came out of his chest in his warm, sugary baritone, Wylan’s heart seized in his chest and he was in trance.

And all I've done for want of wit

To memory now I can't recall

So fill to me the parting glass

Good night and joy be with you all

Singing the last line of the verse, Jesper raised his glass, and several people around the courtyard did the same as a response.

Of all the comrades that e'er I had

They're sorry for my going away

And of all the sweethearts that e'er I had

They'd wish me one more day to stay

But since it falls unto my lot

That I must go and you must not

I gently rise and softly call

Good night and joy be with you all

The low sound of Jesper’s voice was melting and entering Wylan’s bloodstream in a steady, rumbling flow. But then, Jesper shifted to face him directly before he intoned the last verse. Their eyes locked, like inescapable magnetism between a lodestone and durast-tempered iron.

Oh, if I had money enough to spend

And leisure time to sit a while

There is a fair young man in this town

That sorely has my heart beguiled

Heat climbed high to Wylan's face and colored his cheeks with a heavy blush as he noticed that everybody was now looking at him instead of Jesper.

His rosy cheeks and lovely lips

Alone he has my heart in thrall

And as if it wasn't enough, Jesper had the audacity to wink at Wylan.

So fill to me the parting glass

Good night and joy be with you all

Everyone clapped and cheered, except Wylan, who was still too flustered to do so. Jesper, on the other hand, took an exaggerated bow, tipping his hat, left hand over his heart.

To see his lover perform this way was like liquid courage to Wylan, in a way vodka would never be.

Jesper had sung in the F sharp key, and it was a simple enough melody. Forcing himself not to think about it too much, Wylan opened his satchel and took his flute case out. Quickly, resolved to see it to the end and ignoring the trembling of his hands, he assembled his flute and stood. A quiet anticipation fell onto the fortress’ courtyard.

Wylan closed his eyes so he would not see anyone ; neither saints, kings, bastards nor lovers. It was only him and the music. He lifted the flute to his mouth and on instinct, his lips found the correct position.

He started to play, doing his utmost to infuse all of the emotions battling through him into his rendition of Jesper's song. He made it perhaps a more solemn version, and added a sense of yearning and longing into it. It became less a song about sharing drinks and good times, and more about love and loss; about searching for a home and comfort.

He went through three verses and choruses; as many as Jesper had sung. When he played the last note, it faded out with his own breath and was swallowed by the night breeze.

There was no clapping this time, and when he opened his eyes, people were just staring in awe, some of them with tears misting their eyes. And Jesper….

Jesper was weeping, tears streaming down his face and glistening in the fire light. Wylan felt a sob rising into his own throat but before it could reach his lips, Jesper had jumped onto his feet, grinning, and he was clapping wholeheartedly, soon joined by many others.

“You're really talented. You should be a professional musician,” Nina complimented him, bumping her shoulder over his. “I feel like you might be wasted as a bombmaker.”

“Thank you,” Wylan mumbled, flustered once more, his face burning under the weight of all those stares. He took his flute case, disassembled his instrument and put it away, but when he finished that careful task and sat down again, there was an empty space beside Tolya on the opposite bench.

Jesper was gone.

Zoya offered to use the heat from the fire to brew a wintergreen tea, and once it was ready, Wylan accepted a steamy cup of infusion, sighing with relief as he closed his cold fingers around the ceramic.

He kept waiting for Jesper to reappear, but he didn't.

***

The first thing Wylan noticed when he stepped into the stables was the flickering light of a kerosene lantern up in the hay loft, casting shadows on the ceiling. He left his satchel at the bottom of the ladder and climbed, unsure in what sort of mood he’d find Jesper.

He arrived at the top and was welcomed by the sight of woolen military-issued blankets spreaded out on a stack of hay, and Jesper lying on that improvised bed with one hand tucked under his head. “I’m aware it's not the Geldrenner Hotel,” Jesper said, with a nervous quirk of his mouth, “but I tried to make us somewhat of a cozy nest.”

Wylan couldn't help but be grateful for the effort. “It’s perfect, Jes,” he breathed. “Honestly, I think I'd have managed to fall asleep on the floor after the day we've had.”

From the sight of it, the ceiling was too low for Wylan to stand upright, so he did not bother trying and just crawled directly onto the haystack and into Jesper’s waiting arms, resting his head over his bare chest. He was so weary. He did not want to argue, or even discuss anything. He refused any new complications. All he wanted right now was to be close to his lover.

“I was afraid you wouldn't come and join me,” Jesper confessed, burying his fingers into Wylan mussed-up hair.

Wylan closed his eyes. “Well, I'm here.”

“Listen, I thought about everything you said earlier, about us, and –”

“Don't.” Wylan interrupted him, lifting his chin and giving Jesper a pleading look. “We don't have to speak about it right now. Let's forget it for tonight, please? I've seen too many dead bodies today. I just need to feel warm…and alive. Do you think we can do that? Just be together, skin against skin?”

Jesper stayed silent for a beat, still playing with the hair at the back of Wylan’s head. He heaved a sigh. “Yes, we can do that,” he agreed with a slight, thoughtful smile.

Wylan cupped his nape and brought their mouths together, eager for contact, and to feel Jesper respond to it. He did soon enough, dragging Wylan forward and on top of him. Wylan’s narrow hips came nestling naturally between Jesper's lean thighs, and the kiss deepened, growing in passion as Jesper's lips parted like the petals of a datura. Desire sizzled its way down Wylan's spine, settling firmly in his loins. They took their time to simply enjoy the kissing with no immediate threat to interrupt them.

It's only with regret that Wylan parted from Jesper, but he had to sit back on his heels to be able to unbutton and shed the uniform coat and shirt. He shivered as his bare skin became exposed to the cold air of the unheated stables.

Jesper took the folded blanket he had been using as a pillow and sat up to drape it around Wylan's shoulders. “Let's build a bit of heat between us, shall we?”

“Oh, I intend to do just that,” Wylan replied, pushing Jesper back down with a hand on the middle of his chest, tearing a giggle out of him. That same hand skated up to the side of his neck, thumb propping Jesper's chin up and to the side, inviting him to bare his neck. Jesper complied with abandon, his breathing growing heavier. When Wylan kissed and nipped at the sensitive skin of his throat, Jesper let out a strangled noise, which had Wylan take pause and pull back. “I'm sorry,” Wylan apologized, pretty sure he knew what had elicited that reaction. “I didn't have the opportunity to shave in a few days. I know my chin is scratchy.”

But there was nothing but sheer want in Jesper's dark eyes. “No! I love it. Please don't stop.”

Wylan licked his lips before he delved into the crook of Jesper’s neck once more, giving him what he was yearning for; a gentle abuse to his offered flesh with teeth and stubble. He sucked at the fluttering pulse point, making Jesper grow hard and wanton underneath him. All the while, Jesper's hands were roaming over Wylan's shoulders and arms underneath the blanket, fingertips digging into his muscles every now and then.

“I really liked it when you lay on top of me under those benches in the chapel as you were trying to protect me,” Jesper confessed in between moans, hands grasping at Wylan's biceps, “and when you threw that bomb to save my life. I liked having you as my knight in shining armor; it sent a nice thrill down my back. And I was wondering if, maybe…perhaps… you'd be open to the idea of–”

“Fucking you?” Wylan suggested, propping himself up on his elbows to be able to gauge the reaction his words would provoke.

Jesper's pupils blew wide; two pools of open lust. “Yes.”

“I can do that, if that's what you want,” Wylan confirmed in a whisper, threading his fingers in the soft hair at Jesper's temple. “How experienced are you with being on the receiving end?” he inquired gently.

“I've done it often enough not to feel intimidated by it,” Jesper replied, leaning into the touch and leaving a kiss over the inside of Wylan's wrist. “What about you? Have you ever topped before?”

“Oh, treasure,” Wylan said with a slight chuckle. “If you think you're the first boy I tumble in a haystack, you'd be mistaken.”

It was Jesper's turn to let out a surprised laugh. “Who are you? Where's my sweet, innocent Wylan and what have you done with him?”

“I may be sweet, but I'm not that innocent.”

“I can see that,” Jesper murmured, appreciative, reaching up to trace Wylan's rough jawline with his index finger. “And don't worry, I'm really enjoying that side of you…my little firecracker.” Then, Jesper's hand dropped down to Wylan's flank, stroking over his ribcage carefully, eyebrows furrowing in concern. “Will this hurt your ribs, though? Tolya said we should take it easy. I want you very much, but I still hate to think it'd cause you pain.”

“Actually, I think it's a good thing I'm on top. I should be alright. Is it okay if I take you just like that, in that position?” Wylan asked, giving Jesper's hip a soft squeeze for emphasis.

“It's more than alright. All I need is a man…my man.”

“You need someone to take good care of you, huh?”

Jesper squirmed a little underneath him, his erection giving a hard twitch through the fabric still covering it. “Yes, please…”

Wylan leaned down, his mouth so close to Jesper's that it was brushing over his lips as he spoke: “I can be that for you tonight, treasure. I can be your man, and you can be my handsome boy. Is that what you've been craving?”

“Yes, that’s exactly it,” Jesper confirmed, already panting in anticipation.

“Let’s get you naked and ready for me, then,” Wylan decided, placing a soft kiss over his lips before he reached down to undo the buttons on Jesper's pants.

Once they were both equally naked, Jesper reached for his leather coat, which he had left by the ladder. From one of the pockets, he took a small vial and placed it in Wylan's palm.

Wylan recognized the lubricant he had made for the two of them, back in Ketterdam. He gave Jesper a teasing smile. “You brought it with you on our trip here? That was very presumptuous of you.”

“Let’s call it ‘optimistic’? Hopeful, even?” Jesper corrected with a little laugh of embarrassment. “I didn't want to think we wouldn't get to be intimate again.”

“I think that’s very adorable,” Wylan commented. “And I think such sweetness should be rewarded.” He made a bit of the liquid trickle down the palm of his right hand, and the fingers of the left. Jesper let his knees fall to the side, spreading his legs eagerly.

Before he touched Jesper where he clearly wanted to be touched, Wylan leaned forward and kissed the little dolphin-shaped birthmark on his chest, and the beauty spot on his left collarbone, before he drew a nipple between his lips, just for the pleasure of hearing Jesper moan and feel him arch his back; have him grinding up over Wylan's own pelvis, seeking friction.

Wylan kneeled back, and taking pity on the stunning specimen writhing on the blanket in front of him, he closed a slick fist around his cock, giving him a few gentle strokes first. Jesper’s mouth fell open and he screwed his eyes shut, giving in to the sensation. He lifted his hips, in a silent plea for more.

“I'm pretty sure I know what you're asking me for,” Wylan said, his own voice husky, “But I need you to use your words.”

“Your fingers…inside me,” Jesper demanded. His gaze dropped down Wylan's body. “And your cock, Wy ; it's so beautiful, and elegant. I want it inside me too.”

“Soon, treasure,” Wylan soothed, his grip getting slowly firmer around Jesper. “You're being a little impatient, aren't you?” He still gave Jesper the first part of his wish, circling his entrance with expert care, and soon enough, he felt Jesper melt and relax, enough to accept two fingers.

Jesper kneened and grasped at Wylan's forearm. “Patience has never been my strongest suit. And you're making it difficult, Mr Hendriks…”

“Don't worry. I'll make you feel so good,” Wylan promised. “I want to make sure you'll be comfortable, but it's going to be worth the wait. You just have to bear this a little longer.”

The delicate coils of hair falling over Jesper's forehead had already started sticking to his skin with fresh sweat. “Nnnggh, Wylan, please!”

There was certainly a thrill to have Jesper Fahey, feared gangster and gunslinger, unravel beneath him and begging to be ravished. Wylan would be lying if he said he did not enjoy it. Jesper getting desperate was certainly a thing of beauty, and he almost wished he had a pen and paper to sketch him; the shiny sheen of perspiration over his chest, the taut muscles of his stomach, and his dark nipples hardening. It would make for an utterly erotic piece of art.

“I think you're ready for me,” Wylan declared, withdrawing his fingers. “You've been such a good boy for me so far.”

Jesper moaned, loud and wanting. He seemed to get such a kick out of being called “good”, maybe because he carried so much guilt. But Wylan wasn't in a state of mind to analyze it now. All he wanted was to please his lover. Already, Jesper's fingers had found purchase on Wylan's hips and were pulling him forward, between his thighs, sparing a hand to guide his cock into him.

The groan that escape Wylan's throat and he got dragged into the tight heat of Jesper's body was almost disgraceful. It felt so different, and so much better than with any of the other boys he had fucked before. This didn't feel like fucking, in fact.
Their eyes locked and he laced his fingers with Jesper’s. “You’re incredible.”

“So are you…You’re amazing.” Jesper’s own eyes were glassy and he looked a little lost, but there was nothing other than pleasure and adoration in his expression. “Make love to me, please.”

And with those words, Wylan understood what was different about this ; they weren't fucking; they were making love. He had never made love to anyone before. The idea alone set everything on fire.

***

They were at that stage when sex-induced euphoria started to fade, and preoccupations were returning to their heads. Wylan truly wished they weren't, because now, he was thinking of tomorrow again; of the place he’d been offered on a vessel that could bring him far from the threat of his father. He didn't want to mull this over right now; not with Jesper’s head resting over his heart.

“How are your ribs?” Jesper asked in a whisper, his fingers grazing over Wylan’s left side.

“Aching a bit, but it’s more like vague discomfort than pain. What about your nose?”

“Painless. Broken ribs are still a serious thing, but I’m still so glad you didn't have anything worse to show for it.” He shuddered, and somehow, Wylan suspected it didn't have anything to do with the cold of the night.

“You were really scared in there, weren't you?” Wylan asked, knowing Jesper would understand he was referring to the chapel and the Fold.

“I felt so powerless,” Jesper admitted. “I couldn't use my guns, or my fists, or even my durast skills. It made me realize that there are moments where I might not be able to protect you. It scared me even more than the nichevoya, I think.” He shifted to lay his head on Wylan's shoulder instead; a new vantage point to be able to look at his face. “I know you are scared as well… of something, or someone, and that you don't want to speak about it. I hope, one day, you’ll feel at ease enough to tell me. It doesn't have to be today, or even soon. What I'm trying to say, mostly, is that you’re not the only one to feel crippling fear sometimes. I do too…”

Wylan's first reflex was to clam up. He bit down the inside of his cheek, eyes firmly set toward the ceiling. “You say there are things you've done in your past that you're ashamed of,” he told Jesper after a long silence, “but there are things I am that make me ashamed.”

“You mean your inability to read?”

“Not only. And I'm also ashamed of the fact I'm not ready to speak about it. I'm sorry I'm so…closed off.”

Jesper lifted his chin to run the tip of his nose up Wylan’s jawline, leaving a kiss under his ear. “It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not. It’s a bit like your gambling, though; I feel like I can't help it. I can't help but retreat inside impenetrable walls sometimes.”

“You’re just protecting yourself,” Jesper whispered, compassionate. “I can understand that better than you think. We may have different strategies, but the end goal is the same.”

This time, Wylan did not reply, because there was nothing more to say. He kept staring at the ceiling instead.

“I can't wait to be back in Ketterdam, in my bed above the new Crow Club, with you,” Jesper confessed in a drowsy mumble, draping an arm over Wylan’s stomach and nuzzling his face into his shoulder as sleep was gaining on him. It wasn't long before his breathing became shallow and even.

Wylan rearranged the blankets around the two of them, so Jesper wouldn't suffer from the cold during the night. In any normal situation, he would've been too conflicted, too uncertain, too torn to let himself fall asleep. He still needed to think, but slumber was tugging on his eyelids. The events of the day had taken a toll on him that only rest could begin to fix. Wylan didn't know the decision he would make, and what answer he would give Nikolai at noon the next day. This was only twelve hours away, perhaps even less than that by now.

On paper, not returning to Kerch and embarking on a journey on the Volkvony was the most sensible option; the one that made the most sense. However, there was a major problem with that plan: the fact he was now convinced to be in love with Jesper Fahey.

Chapter Text

Kaz was positively fuming. Underneath the table, his hand gripped his cane with such violence the crow’s head would have melted if there had been even a modicum of small science in his blood.

Nikolai studied Kaz's impassive expression. “I hope you’re not angry that I’ve made them this proposition,” he said, leaning over the table with one hand pressed flat over a stack of papers bearing the royal seal.

“Of course I’m not angry,” Kaz lied in his most expert way. He took the pardon letter meant for Nina’s man from the table, folded it and placed it in his coat’s inner pocket. How dared that pesky little prince, not even crowned king yet, try to poach two of his Crows from him? The taste of a few choice insults burned his tongue like acid, and he wished he could erase that smug smile from Nikolai's face, but that would make for poor business. He had to sort their money first, then, he'd take care of the deserters himself; one in particular.

“About our payment,” Kaz said. “We agreed on 500 000 kruge worth of gold.”

“Yes. And you wanted it in gold bars to be divided between your crew,” Nikolai reminded him.

“Well, I've changed my mind,” Kaz stated. “I want 100 000 in gold, the rest in checks to be cashed-in from a bank account you Lantsovs no doubt own in Ketterdam.”

“As you wish,” Nikolai said with a shrug, and reached out to grab a pile of blank checks from a drawer.

***

The first thing Jesper noticed when he woke up was the sensation of hay strands prickling his back through the wool blanket. The second thing was the empty spot by his side, where Wylan should have been. He ran his hand over the blanket and found it cold. His lover had been gone for a while. His clothes were gone too, which meant he wasn't running around naked in the fort, so at least there was that.

Jesper couldn't help the tinge of disappointment that followed as he collected his kilt and the shirt he had washed at the river the day before. He would've loved to find Wylan still tucked by his side under the covers. He could have woken him with kisses to his shoulder, whispering compliments in the crook of his neck. But perhaps Wylan had gotten hungry and went in search of food, and he couldn't really fault him for that.

When Jesper climbed down to the bottom of the ladder, he noticed that Wylan’s satchel was gone as well, and for some reason, this made him uneasy.

He left the stables in search of Wylan and ended up in the main courtyard, but found no sign of his lover there. He wandered the corridors inside the fort, and crossed path with Nina,

“I haven't spoken to Wylan, but Inej was looking for you, actually,” Nina informed him. “She wanted to see you before she–”

“Before she what ?”

“I'll….I'll let her explain, okay?”

“But you haven't seen Wylan.”

“No, I haven't. Not since the bonfire last night.”

Jesper then headed to the moats, thinking that, perhaps, he'd find Wylan on the inferni's grave, but no luck there either. He circled around the moats and went to the fort’s main gate leading outside the inner bailey and ended his fruitless search by sitting, defeated, on a rock at the foot of the stonewalls. The interaction with Nina had left a strange weakness in his legs, like the earth was about to get pulled from under his feet like the proverbial rug.

Was Wylan avoiding him again? Perhaps there was ground for that, since they hadn't truly sorted out their issues the night before. They had succumbed to their desire for one another instead. And what about Inej? Did Nina mean to imply that Inej was ready to leave the Crows? She had mentioned it before, during their last job in Ravka. It was in the realm of possibilities, but not one Jesper was ready to contemplate.

A sudden squall made him shiver, and out of reflex, he reached for his waistcoat with the intention of buttoning it, only to feel, and remember, that he didn't have any buttons left. They had all been used as bullet substitutes, but, perhaps, he could use some of his current bullets to fabrikate buttons to replace them.

He fished a spare bullet from a cartridge and squeezed it inside his fist, trying his best to concentrate his will, intent, and small science through the palm of his hand, just like his mother had shown him all those years ago. But his powers felt corroded; rusty from the lack of practice and years of little use. When his body wasn't pumping adrenaline from a fight and the need to survive, his durast skills were even harder to channel. He barely dared open his fist to look at the bullet and what it had become. In the end, he had managed to flatten the tip of it, but that's all he could do, and when he tried shaping it some more, the metal was unresponsive. He threw it over his shoulder and it went bouncing over a rock with a pathetic ticking noise. He took a second bullet from his cartridge. This time, he focused all his might into shaping the matter, chasing all other thoughts of Inej, or Wylan, or anyone else, and keeping his emotions at bay. This time, when he opened his fist, he found something flat and decidedly more button-shaped. He pursed his lips and nodded in satisfaction, but when he tried to fit it on his waistcoat, he realized it was too big and bulky to go through the buttonhole. He let out a loud groan of frustration and hung his head in defeat.

Pigeons flew off in a hurry from a nook in the wall above him. He doubted his voice alone had startled the birds, and he spied a pair of boots with knives strapped to them from the corner of his eyes. Inej had prepared like someone going on a mission; not someone sailing home. This confirmed Jesper's suspicions. “You're not coming back to Ketterdam, are you?”

She sighed and averted her gaze when he looked up at her.

“Damn,” Jesper commented. His heart sunk in his chest, but he crossed his legs, pretending to examine his misshapen bullet-turned-button instead. “I'm already the looks of the operation. I guess I'm going to have to be the heart now too,” he quipped, and smiled at her, trying to make light of the situation.

She sat down on a low section of crumbled wall, across from him. She took a deep breath, and threw a glance at the sky, as if imploring her saints to give her strength. "I have to find my brother."

Jesper nodded, his eyes back on his button, as if the metal could turn into a shield that would protect him from the pain and loss he would have to face without her. "Yeah."

"I have to reunite my family, something I should have done a long time ago."

"Well, in your defense, you've been a little bit busy saving the world, twice over,” he pointed out.

This managed to pull the hint of a smile out of her, but it turned to a dry sob, and she shook her head. A tear glimmered at the corner of her eye.

Jesper stood. The last thing he wanted was to add to the toll of this separation. She did not need guilt on top of everything else. "You don't have to feel bad for going," he assured her.

She looked up at him. "Harij is my brother, and my parents might be my blood, but you," she stood in turn, and grabbed onto the flaps of his waistcoat for emphasis, her voice wet with tears, "you, Jesper, are my family too."

Of course he already knew that. He knew Inej had become like a sister to him, and Kaz, for all his faults, was Jesper's brother through thick and thin. And to know that their strange little Crow family was to be split apart made his soul nauseous. He knew for a fact that sometimes, when family members left, no matter how much you loved them, they didn't always come back. His mother never did.

“Can you–?” Inej started asking, but Jesper had anticipated the question.

“Oh yeah! I'll look out for him,” he assured her, “as much as he lets me, at least.” He couldn't help a small eyeroll in anticipation of the task ahead. Trying to protect Kaz Brekker was a tall order, even more when it came to protect Kaz from himself.

Now that this was said, Inej seemed at a loss. She still stood a step away from Jesper, but was staring at the stonewall behind him.

Jesper, on the other hand, knew he couldn't let her go without holding her one last time. When he bent down and dragged her into his arms, she gasped, but she soon relaxed in the familiarity and safety of his embrace. There it was; incense and nutmeg. Ghezen, he was going to miss the scent of her, the scent of home ; he was going to miss her.

"I'm so going to miss you," she murmured, as if reading his mind, hugging him around the shoulders.

"Oh yeah!" he boasted, pulling back just enough to see her giggle through her tears. "Of course you will!” That’s what he always did when she was sad : try to make her laugh. That was the role of a big brother. But he was serious again, his heart clenching in his chest as he took her hand and brought it to his mouth, kissing the back of it.

With a faint sob, she rested her head forward onto his sternum. He put his chin over her head, the pain concentrating in the middle of his chest, where she had her brow pressed. It felt as if a piece of his heart was being ripped out of him. He put a fierce kiss in her hair, gritting his teeth. He wouldn't cry, not in front of her. She didn't need that burden – she didn't need the guilt. He had to put on a brave face.

She stepped back and smiled at him, soft and fond, and pivoted to leave.
A sob raised in Jesper's throat, threatening to strangle him, but he suppressed it."Where are you going now?" he managed to croak.

She turned around, with sadness in her eyes. "To say my prayers."

He snapped his fingers in understanding. Of course. Inej being Inej, it all made sense. He wasn't even sure why he had asked the question in the first place. Perhaps he foolishly hoped she would change her mind, somehow. That she would say this was all a joke and that, of course, she was coming back to Ketterdam. Inej wasn't the type to pull a prank, though, and the pain in her eyes had been apparent and genuine.

She disappeared around a bend in the bailey wall and back through the gate, and only then did Jesper allow himself to break down. The dam across his throat broke, and tears spilled. He took a deep, shuddering breath, but more grief was pouring out of him than what he could contain.

***

So far, Kaz had managed to keep Wylan at arm's length, waiting for the right moment to use him as an asset ; and that moment would come, without a doubt. Back in Ketterdam, he had eyes and ears everywhere in the city ; listening to every rumor, every news, and he had a Wraith whispering in his ear as well. Jan Van Eck, they said, once only trading in silk from Shu Han, sugar from the Colonies and gold from the west ravkan mines, had suddenly started buying jurda ; an awful lot of it. The wind was changing. There was something brewing in the biggest mansion on the Geldstraat, and when money was going to start oozing out of Jan Van Eck, Kaz would be waiting to get his hands on it. Kaz held perhaps the most important thing a mercher could have; the best bargaining chip : his eldest son. This had to be worth more than gold. Kaz was playing the long game. It could take a few months, maybe even a few years, and Kaz wasn't sure how he'd make it happen, but he would use Wylan Van Eck to his advantage at some point. In the meantime, the kid was good enough a demo man to keep around. He could be useful in other ways before the big payoff. If Wylan took the sea on the Volkvony, however, this would make Kaz’s plan derail, and he very much wanted to keep everything on track.

If Kaz had been a less subtle man, he could have resorted to blackmail to convince the merchling to come back to Ketterdam with the Crows. Clearly, for whatever reason, Wylan didn't want anyone to know he had spent his childhood in silk diapers on the Geldstraat. Kaz could always threaten to reveal who he was if he didn't come home like a good boy. Also, by asking Nikolai for checks instead of gold, he had made sure Wylan wouldn't get a dime unless he set foot in a kerch bank to cash his share of the royal payment. It could be incentive enough to lure him back, but, truly, the check was just a failsafe. Kaz had another card in his sleeve, perhaps an even more effective one : love. Crazy, stupid love. Wylan's silly infatuation with Kaz's gunslinger, annoying at first, would prove useful after all.

Kaz wouldn't have to threaten, argue, or even dangle a golden carrot. He wouldn't even have to say a single word to convince Wylan to come home with the Crows : Jesper was going to do the work for him.

The sun was almost at its zenith when Kaz found Jesper sitting outside the fort’s main gate, chewing jurda and twirling his guns, staring at the sprawling landscape with the look of a lost puppy. He still had tear streaks on his face, and for a split second, Kaz regretted he was going to use him to shackle Wylan. It only lasted a second, however.

Kaz had to clear his throat for Jesper to acknowledge him.

Jesper spit out his jurda in the grass and swallowed. “Inej is leaving,” he said flatly, although the underlying distress simmered close to the surface.

“Yes, I know.”

The tension in Jesper's jawline increased. “Am I the last one to learn about this? As usual?”

Kaz shook his head, and spreaded his feet to give himself a better balance. His leg ached, and the humidity inside the fort during the night hadn't helped. “She hasn't told me herself. I learned it from Lantsov.”

“Hm,” Jesper emitted. He holstered his revolvers, before looking at Kaz again. “She asked me to look out for you, you know, while she's gone.”

From his tone, Jesper seemed to imply that, perhaps, Kaz might not deserve such goodness. The thing was : Kaz agreed with him. “I don't see why you should do that; look out for me, that is.”

Jesper raised an eyebrow. “Which is exactly the reason why I should.” His fingers were still on the gun handles, and he tapped a restless tempo over one of them with his rings. He worried his bottom lip between his teeth in silence for a bit. “She cares about you, you know. And if maybe, for once, you show her that you care too, perhaps you can convince her to come back to Ketterdam with us. Surely you….we can help her find her family. She doesn't need to sail off to the end of the world by herself for that.”

Kaz’s heart seized in his chest, as if it had just been dipped in an icy water well. He had already tried to find Inej’s family, but the track had gone cold. However, he had no intention of taking the bait Jesper was laying out for him. “What about Wylan?” he said instead.

A crease appeared between Jesper’s eyebrows. “What about him?”

“Instead of worrying about my sentimental life, you should perhaps worry about yours,” Kaz pointed out. “I thought you’d be more upset that Wylan might not come back to Ketterdam with us.”

Jesper stiffened. “Wh– What? Wylan isn't coming home? How? Why?”

“He hasn't told you?” This was blatant manipulation on Kaz's part. He had never been above that sort of tactic, but he also felt like Jesper had a right to know. “Just like Inej ; he's been offered a place on the Volkvony with Mal.”

The crease between Jesper's eyebrows deepened; like a crack appearing in the midst of an earthquake. “No. He hasn't told me anything.”

“Well,” Kaz said, feigning detachment. “He's at least considering taking the job, because he told Lantsov he'd think about it and give him his final answer today at noon.”

Snatching his hat from the grass, Jesper scrambled back to his feet. “What time is it?” he asked urgently. From the amount of white Kaz could see in his eyes, he surmised Jesper was seized by a right amount of panic.

Kaz pulled his pocket watch from inside his waistcoat and pressed the button to flip open the lid. “Eleven-forty two,” he announced.

“I….I have to find him,” Jesper decided, already rushing past Kaz, but then he stopped abruptly and spun around on his heels, scrutinizing Kaz’s face for a beat, eyes narrowed, before he said. “You don't seem to care that Wylan could be leaving us. He's a Crow; just like Inej.”

Kaz gave a calculated shrug. “There are other demolition experts. You said it yourself: Raske is better, or even Pim.”

“Well, I was wrong. I don't think there's anyone like Wylan,” Jesper declared, putting his top hat back on his head. “By the way, Inej has gone to the chapel to pray. You’ll find her there.” And with these last words hanging in the air between them, Jesper ambled through the gate and into the fortress, leaving Kaz to ponder on his own.

Kaz did not have to worry about Wylan anymore. Jesper would play his part in a plan he wasn't even aware existed. Because Wylan had to travel back to the Barrel with them. As for Inej…things weren't so clean cut. Part of him wanted to let Inej go. He would have had to let her go one way or another. She wasn't his to keep; not forever anyway. She had always been determined to find her family, ever since she set foot in Ketterdam, even before she met Kaz. But on the other hand, the idea of her gone set Kaz off balance. His hand closed around the pommel of his cane with a bit more strength. Losing Inej would be exactly like losing his cane. Even if he was used to the pain, he wasn't sure how he'd get around anymore without something….someone to lean on to.

Jordan Reitvelt Senior, Kaz's father, had once told his younger son this phrase that stuck with him : “Love, in any of its forms, cannot be selfish.” The way Kaz remembered it; his father’s tone sounded just like Inej when she'd hit him over the head with one of her suli proverbs, her dark eyebrows furrowed and fierce. The problem was that selfishness had kept Kaz alive so far. If he hadn't been focused solely on his own interest and self-preservation, he would never have survived the Barrel. He would've ended up floating in the harbor like Jordie, or stabbed in a gutter somewhere. Love and selflessness, on the other hand, had killed his father. If he hadn't been in that field that day, out of affection for their neighbors and desire to help them plow their field, the accident wouldn't have happened. Kaz would still have a father, and Jordie wouldn't have had to die in an alleyway in Ketterdam. The path of abnegation was a dangerous one to thread.

***

As Jesper promised, Kaz found Inej inside the fort's chapel, sitting at one of the front rows benches, her long, dark hair like a veil over her head, and her eyes lifted to the stained glass window representing the Sun Summoner in all her glory. Her hand was clutching at the image of Sankta Lizabetta's on her necklace.

Someone had put fresh candles on every one of the candelabras, and Kaz wondered if she had been the one lighting them. In any case, the golden embroidering on her sleeves shimmered in the candlelight. She might as well have been a sun saint herself.

The thumping of Kaz's cane on the hard stone floor gave away his approach. She put the necklace back into her collar, as if he had caught her doing something reprehensible.

He stopped a few feet away from where she sat. She didn't turn to look his way, but she opened and closed her mouth, as if on the verge of saying something. After a short silence, Kaz spoke up. “Lantsov paid up. Everyone will get their cut.” He didn't think it pertinent to inform her that she'd be the only one paid in gold as the rest of them would get checks.

She didn't move from her spot but finally turned her head to look at him, hesitation in her eyes. “And Nina?”

“She'll receive a pardon for deserting, and another for her Fjerdan. As long as he stays out of trouble, the charges will be dropped.”

Inej gave the bearest of nods.

Kaz forced the next words out of himself, even if they cost him. “I also wanted to say goodbye.”

She looked at him in surprise, her lips slightly parted. “I didn't think you were the sentimental type,” she said, with a note of bitterness, and yet, also a touch of hope.

Inej was right. He wasn't sentimental. And yet he still tried to do the right thing for her. Jordie would never come back, but maybe Inej's brother still could. And in his pocket, Kaz had a piece of paper, with the name of an auctioneer who could perhaps identify the slaver who had taken Harij. By giving her this piece of paper, he was taking the selfless route. Maybe, his father would be proud, if he could stop spinning in his grave from all the other shady things Kaz had done.

Maybe he was unable to shed tears like Jesper did, but helping Inej on her mission was Kaz’s own way to show that he cared. And yet, despite his resolve, everything in him screamed: “Please don't go. Don't leave. Come back with me to Ketterdam. I want you. I want to be with you.”

***

“Please don't go. Don't leave me. Come back with me to Ketterdam. I want you. I want to be with you.” Like a gun barrel in a game of ravkan roulette, these thoughts were spinning in Jesper's brain at high speed. His long legs allowed him to cover a lot of distance in a short amount of time, but his search for Wylan through the fort was too disorganized and frantic to yield efficient results.

He stopped in the middle of the training courtyard, and let out a shout of anger. It startled a couple of mourning doves, which flew away over the target practice range. If Wylan was leaving; if he was joining the crew of the Volkvony, where would he be right now?

Jesper cursed his own inability to focus and think in moments when emotions and restlessness took over. “Breathe, Jes. Stop, and breathe.” Then, after two good intakes of air, Jesper saw it in a flash ; the Hummingbird of course. Why on earth had he not thought of it? The flying craft was moored near the north range of the fort, and Jesper took off running in that direction with purpose and intent.

His belated intuition proved right. When he walked around the powder storage building, he caught a glimpse of Wylan's unruly mop of hair and the leather satchel strapped to his back. He was talking with Tolya, at the bottom of the ramp leading on-board the aircraft. Maybe Jesper was too late already; maybe Wylan had made up his mind.

Jesper’s expression hardened, as if turning into a mask of the Madman.

The look on his face prompted Tolya to make himself scarce as soon as he noticed Jesper walking their way.

Wylan turned around, eyes wide in surprise. “Oh, Jes, I-”

“Tell me Kaz’s wrong,” Jesper cut him off, “that none of it is true.”

“What?” Wylan asked, looking genuinely confused at the mention of Kaz.

“Were you planning on leaving me the same way you did after our first night together?” Jesper demanded to know. “Did you intend on letting me wake up alone? Without a goodbye? A note? Anything?”

The remark stung Wylan to the quick. “You know full well I can't write a note! But no, of course, I wasn't going to do that!”

The ire abated in Jesper all at once, like ashes scattered by the wind. “I'm sorry, I didn't mean to–” He groaned in frustration rubbing his face. His anger was aimed at himself more than anything else. With his problematic gambling and hesitation to commit, he had given his lover plenty of reasons to leave. “Wylan. I'm sorry. I just….. I don't want to lose you as well,” he said, trying to ignore the stinging of unshed tears.

“As well?” Wylan asked, searching Jesper’s face with eyes more soft and gentle than Jesper perhaps deserved. “So, I gather Inej said her goodbyes, then?”

“You knew? You knew she was leaving?” Wylan knew and he hadn't told him anything. This was another blow to Jesper's heart. Why was he always the last one to learn of his friends’ plans? Did they really mistrust him that much?

“She told me last night, but she made me swear to keep it a secret,” Wylan confessed, reaching for Jesper’s forearm and giving it an hesitant squeeze. “She wanted to tell you herself.”

Eyes to the heavens, Jesper drew a deep sigh. “I understand,” he said after a beat, and took Wylan’s hand in his. “But you should’ve told me about your own intentions, though. We shouldn't keep stuff from each other anymore; at least, not the important ones.”

Wylan only stared back, blinking, in an effort to process a collection of feelings Jesper failed to sort out. Regret? Agreement? Hesitation?

However, Jesper knew that if he wanted to keep Wylan, he had to give him more than some pathetic, blubbering excuse. He had to put his head on the chopping block and hope his lover would spare him. He rubbed the side of Wylan’s wrist with the pad of his thumb.

“What I wanted to tell you last night before we….well, before we got distracted, was that I care about you, Wy. Like a lot.” Now that he had begun talking, the words could only flow out of his lungs like the waterfalls in the Zemeni outback. It was pointless to try and contain them. “And I enjoy having you around. I want to keep you around, so badly. And if wishing to be with you is selfish; if wanting to be your boyfriend despite my flaws is self-serving, then, perhaps, I ought to be selfish. I want to be with you. I want us to be a couple, if that’s what you want as well, of course.”

Jesper would have said anything to prevent Wylan from walking away at that point. However, everything that came out of his mouth was still genuine. Nobody had ever adored Jesper quite the same way Wylan did, but, more importantly, no one had ever made Jesper act so gentle, earnest, attentionate, caring and also brave, in a calm, steadfast way. Perhaps those qualities had existed within him all along, but Wylan had unlocked them all ; allowed them to be expressed without fears or misgivings.

A mist of emotion was settling like morning dew in Wylan's hazel eyes. “Oh Jes,” he breathed. “Yes, I want that.”

“You do?” Jesper still could quite believe his luck.

“Of course I do, silly,” Wylan assured him, grasping at his buttonless waistcoat, beaming like the sun liberated from the Fold at last. A slight shadow of self doubt veiled his expression for an instant. “I've never been anyone's boyfriend though.”

“Me neither,” Jesper replied with a slight chuckle, “but we'll figure it out.” He cupped Wylan’s jaw and angled his face up toward him. “We’ll figure it out together.” Giddy, he leaned down and kissed him, heart leaping like a spring lamb experiencing grass for the first time in its life. Wylan’s lips were so fresh and eager, and Jesper wanted to lose himself in that kiss, never to be found again. There was still an important matter at hand, though. He pulled away, but rested his forehead over Wylan's. “Have you spoken to Nikolai yet?” Would it be even more painful if they parted now, as boyfriends, instead of mere friends and lovers? Surely it would.

“Not yet.”

“And what will you tell him?”

“I'll tell him I’m turning down his offer,” Wylan whispered. “I'm going back to Ketterdam with you.”

Jesper released a long exhale of sheer relief, tension lifting from his spine. “ Okay. I'm happy about that.” He threaded his fingers through the impossibly soft hair at the nape of Wylan's neck, kissing his temple and breathing in the clean, homely scent of lavender. “You make me so happy, Wy.”

“You make me happy too, you know,” Wylan confessed in turn, circling Jesper's waist. He leaned forward to press his lips to the beauty mark between Jesper’s clavicle and the hollow of his throat.

“Besides,” Jesper added, “the Crows need their demo man, and there's no one better than you.” He couldn't help but drag Wylan into another kiss, which increased in heat rapidly, when Wylan arched up into it, his hands bunching the back of Jesper's shirt in an effort to erase any space between their bodies. Oh, Jesper was definitely looking forward to having Wylan alone in his bedroom at the Slat, with a proper bed for them to enjoy…

“Hey!” Tolya hailed from the deck of the Hummingbird. “I thought I said no overly passionate kissing and groping!” he scolded.

“I'm sorry!” Jesper shouted back, “but I have Wylan Hendriks as a boyfriend now. I think that gives me a pass.” Wylan giggled in his arms and Jesper felt on top of the world, with no intention of ever climbing down.

***

From the deck of the Svatava, Jesper could see the east coast of Kerch, and the grey silhouette of Ketterdam growing bigger and bigger as the ship approached Fifth Harbor. A familiar cloud of pollution from the factories’ coal furnaces put a thick cloak over the city, and the top of the Church of Barter disappeared into it, leaving the statue of Ghezen’s hands with only wrists to show. Under the pale, cloudy sunset, Hellgate looked like an ominous spot on a sick body. Nevertheless, Jesper was thrilled.

“Home sweet home!” he exclaimed, opening his arms wide as if to embrace the whole city at once. “Ah Ketterdam, you dirty old slag! I've missed you!” He turned to Wylan, who was standing at his side on the deck, his elbows and forearms resting atop the railing. “Isn't it just great to be back?”

“I suppose,” Wylan offered with a shrug. “Though, I must admit, I'm looking forward to taking an actual, warm bath and getting a change of clothes.”

“Dibs on the bathtub! Ladies first,” Nina declared, before Jesper even had the time to form a mental image of himself holding Wylan’s splendid body as they'd sink together in the steaming water.

“Hey! It's not fair,” Jesper protested, “we called it first!”

Nina gave him a waggle of her eyebrows. “You’re always welcome to share the tub with me, Fahey.”

Jesper scoffed. “I'm a taken man now, I'll have you know.” He put his arm around Wylan’s waist for emphasis.

“I need to wash early,” Nina insisted, her expression growing somber. “I want to see Matthias tonight, and I don't want it to be while I smell like a ravkan military camp.”

Jesper and Wylan exchanged a quick look.

“Nina? Do you want me…us…to come with you to Hellgate?” Wylan offered.

She shook her head. “No. I have to do this alone. Thanks, though. You're a sweetheart.” She reached out and rubbed the back of Wylan’s shoulder before walking away toward the bow of the ship. Maybe she wanted to discuss something with Kaz who was sitting alone and brooding on that end of the vessel. Or maybe, she just needed time on her own.

The ship skirted Hellgate Island some minutes later, and perhaps this was the reason why Nina wished to keep to herself. To feel herself so close, yet so far from the man she loved must be an ordeal. Jesper was still holding his boyfriend and his fingers curled around Wylan's hip at the thought.

Kaz's mopping was over, apparently, because as the ship went past the first navigation buoy of the harbor, he materialized at Jesper's side, a cold, calculated determination in his eyes, and his slicked-back hair unmoving despite the ocean wind.

“Mark my words, Jesper,” Kaz said. “One day soon, this will all be ours.”

“Fifth harbor?” Jesper asked, looking back toward the city.

“Yes, but not only. I'm talking about the whole Barrel.”

Jesper wanted to laugh, but Kaz’s expression was dead serious. What made him so confident? Sure, Pekka Rollins had been removed from the picture, but to state something like this, Kaz had to have an ace up his sleeve and a scheme firmly planted in his brain.

One thing was for sure, if Kaz couldn't have Inej, he’d aim for the city instead. Jesper also knew this would never be satisfactory enough. Three or four cities would never make up for all of what Inej was. But Kaz needed a purpose, or an enemy to destroy; something to fill the void left behind by the fall of Pekka Rollins and Inej's departure. The other gangs, however, wouldn't take Kaz's ambitions lying down. Jesper's free hand sought the handle of the revolver at his left hip. Every petty crime boss would put up a fight against this new claim for domination, but Jesper was ready.

As soon as the four remaining Crows set foot off the ship and on the docks, Kaz handed the pardon letter for Matthias to Nina. She clutched it to her heart. Then, he gave Jesper and Wylan squares of paper as well.

“Checks? Really?” Jesper scoffed, as he examined it.

Wylan was staring down at his own, blinking.

Jesper eyed Kaz in reproach. “What happened to good old gold?”

“Didn't want to carry that with us on the ship,” Kaz argued. “Besides, perhaps this can force you to open an account and only spend that money a little at a time, instead of blowing it all on a month-long bender.”

Jesper burst out laughing, as if Kaz had made an especially funny joke. “I could also put some away on a retirement plan while I’m at it!” he added. The idea in itself was hilarious.

In the meantime, Wylan had put his check away, safe in one of his satchel’s inner pockets.

“Do you want to go and cash yours right away?” Jesper asked him, waving his own check for emphasis.

“I can wait until tomorrow,” Wylan said with a tilt of his head.

“Yeah okay,” Jesper replied, hiding his disappointment and pocketing the check. In any ordinary circumstances, he would've already been running at the bank, and would be sitting at a gambling table in less time than it took to say “Three Man Bramble”. The thought and the temptation still burned his mind in tandem.

“Let’s go to the Slat, then,” Kaz declared.

“You guys go ahead,” Jesper said. “I just have to make a quick detour to the tailor to sort that….situation,” he added, pointing at his undone, buttonless waistcoat. Perhaps, he could still get away with sneaking to the bank. He could pay Domhnaill in advance…and could treat himself on his way home, perhaps even buy something nice for Wylan while he was at it.

“I’ll come with you,” Wylan decided, and with that statement, vanished Jesper's prospect of just one, sneaky little game of Makker's Wheel at Club Cumulus. But the idea of strolling the neighborhood with his brand new boyfriend on his arm was an appealing one as well.

“See you later, then,” Jesper told the others. Kaz answered with a nod of his head, and Nina with a wave of her hand as they parted ways.

Jesper laced his fingers with Wylan's and they went up the lane leading from the harbor toward Garenstraat.

The city had been moving on as usual in Jesper's absence, not that he had expected otherwise, but somehow, even the potent smells coming from the fishmongers’ shops and the noises of badly oiled carriage wheels on the cobblestones pleased his nose and ears with their familiarity.

Because he was in a good mood, and since they were both peckish, Jesper bought stroopwafels from a street vendor. He offered them to Wylan with a wide grin, proud of his own romantic gesture. The pride and the grin in his face grew even wider when Wylan rewarded him with a pretty blush and a chaste, sugary peck on the lips.

They ate and chatted as they walked, and Jesper barely thought about Inej or the call of the Makker’s Wheel as Wylan happily shared his plans for buying a kaelish flute and perhaps even a harmonica.

Jesper almost dropped his last wafels when they arrived at the tailor shop and he saw the state of the place. Wood planks had been haphazardly put across the windows and several copies of the same poster were nailed to the door. “What in the Saint’s–” Jesper cursed, as he tore one of the posters off.

“What does it say?” Wylan asked, staring at the words, but unable to make sense of them.

“Dhòmhnaill’s been arrested by the Stadwatch.”

Wylan's face went a few shades paler. “On what charges?”

“Agitation, organization of an illegal gathering, incitement to riot, destruction of private property and disruption of the public order,” Jesper enumerated blankly, but his heart was hammering, hard and angry in his chest.

“The céilí,” Wylan whispered, throwing nervous glances around, as if any passerby could be Stadwatch in disguise.

“Most likely.”

Jesper took a few more seconds to read the rest of the poster in his mind. “It’s not all – they're looking for other individuals,” he told Wylan, “ other “public agitators” as they put it : Dermuid MacKinley, Margaret Owain, Edmund MacLoed, Isabel Fahey, no relation, although I know who she is, nice lady; mother of four, and last but not least: Rory O’ Hara.”

“Rory the musician?” Wylan asked in a small voice.

“Yeah that’s him,” Jesper confirmed with a sigh. He crushed the poster into a ball and shoved it in his trousers’ pocket.

“Do you know where they could be?”

“In hiding no doubt, but I've no idea where. With a bit of luck, they were able to flee the city. There's a big bounty on their head, though: 15 000 kruge reward for any information leading to their arrest.”

Wylan’s eyes widened. This was a substantial sum to spend on any tip, even useful. “Offered by the Stadwatch? Are they that rich?”

“No; offered by that mercher Van Eck.”

Wylan now looked more green than white, as if on the verge of throwing up.

Jesper touched his arm, concerned. “Wy? Are you alright?”

“Yes, I'm fine,” Wylan replied, wiping some sweat pearling at his brow. “I might be still seasick from the ship.”

“You looked fine when we were on the ship,” Jesper countered, placing his wrist over Wylan’s forehead. He felt more cold than feverish. “What happened?”

Wylan evaded his touch and stepped back, shaking his head. He had this scared-rabbit stare Jesper hadn’t seen on his face for a while. “I might be tired, or hungry. I don't know.”

“It's possible,” Jesper admitted, unable to shake his worry. “Let's go to the Slat. It's not today that I'm gonna get my buttons fixed, obviously, and there's nothing we can do for poor Dhòmhnaill right now.”

He took Wylan’s hand again and pulled him away from the desolating scene. Staying in this part of the neighborhood wasn't a good idea, with the Stadwatch on the lookout for kaelish troublemakers and Jesper wearing a kilt and his guns. Meanwhile, the poster was burning a hole in Jesper’s pocket. What he hadn't told Wylan was that Jan Van Eck owned the building in which the Green Dragon brewery was operating, and the destruction of property Dhòmhnaill had been accused of was Wylan's bomb’s doing. It was Wylan that Councilman Van Eck and the Stadwatch were looking for. They didn't know who exactly had set that bomb off, and Jesper intended on keeping it that way. He also wanted to counter Wylan’s self-sacrificing tendencies by keeping that information from him…at least for now.

Jesper threw the rest of his stroopwafel in the gutter, having lost all appetite, and they walked the rest of the way to the Slat in alert silence, Wylan squeezing his hand so tight Jesper almost feared for his own circulation.

“Home at last,” Jesper rejoiced when he pushed open the front doors of the Crow Club.
Wylan remained mute, but when he put his satchel down on the floor of Jesper's bedroom and removed his leather coat, his face had regained healthier colors and his shoulders had lost some of their stiffness. He even went to him for a hug, which Jesper was just too happy to provide, wrapping Wylan tight into his arms and holding him close to his chest. They stayed there for a while, just breathing in sync. Outside, it had started to rain and a few timid droplets were knocking at the window.

Jesper closed his eyes, face buried in Wylan's hair. “I'm so glad we're back, and that you’re here with me.”

Wylan pulled away to look at him, cheeks pink and something naughty twinkling in the depth of his eyes. “I'm sure you're going to make it worth my while.”

“Oh yes believe me,” Jesper purred in response, dragging a finger on the light stubble over Wylan's jawline. “I have a lot planned for you.”

“Yes? Like what?”

Jesper walked forward, backing Wylan up towards the bed until he could have him lie down on it. Jesper crawled over him, pressing him to the mattress. “I’m going to ruin you with pleasure, darling,” Jesper promised. “I’ll make sure to satisfy you so deeply and thoroughly that by the time I'm done with you, you'll almost be disappearing and fading away between my arms.” Wylan turned his head to the side with a quiet whimper, and Jesper took it as an invitation to grace his neck with open-mouthed kisses and gentle love bites. “And now that I've got all that money,” Jesper went on, whispering over the skin his teeth had reddened, “I'm going to pamper you like you've never been pampered in your life. You’re going to be utterly spoiled; like one of those Geldstraat merchlings.”

Wylan shifted under him, uncomfortable. Jesper supposed he was getting a little heavy over his boyfriend's still healing ribs, so he braced himself on his elbow, releasing some of his weight from Wylan's chest. “Did you know Kaz called you that once? At Ohval’s house: he called you a merchling.” Jesper wasn't sure why that odd comment from Kaz was coming back to his mind just now.

Eyes wide and sheepish, Wylan was staring up at Jesper like a kid caught shoplifting at the fruit market. “Just because I'm not a Barrel-endured criminal doesn't mean I'm like some bourgeois brat either.”

“No, I suppose not,” Jesper agreed. “You're smart, courageous, capable, and ingenious,” he enumerated, punctuating each of the compliments with a light kiss across Wylan's cheekbones. “You've proven it more than once.”

Wylan grabbed the back of his neck and pulled him in for a hungry kiss, immediately reaching to untuck Jesper’s shirt from his kilt and slipping his hand underneath, seeking contact. His fingers clawed at the small of Jesper’s back, bringing their hips together and grinding up against him. He moaned into Jesper’s mouth and the sound was almost feral in its despair. There was an urgency to all of this that Jesper had never quite witnessed from him before; as if Wylan thought this would be the last time they’d touch and he absolutely had to drink the sensation to the very last drop.

“Do you want me, perchance?” Jesper managed to mutter against Wylan’s lips, chuckling a little at his eagerness.

“That's a silly question,” Wylan replied, gripping at the nape of his neck like a lifeline. “I want you all the time.”

“And how do you want me tonight, then?”

“I could mount and ride you,” Wylan suggested, feverish with need. He divested Jesper from his waistcoat in a haste and was busy unbuttoning his shirt already.

“Like the magnificent Zemeni stallion that I am?” Jesper teased with a grin, shoving his freshly discarded shirt under one of the pillows. “I'd love that very much.” The idea of Wylan bracing his hips with those milky thighs and lowering himself on him; that was pretty close to his definition of heaven.

Soon enough, Jesper found himself naked, reclining against the bed’s headboard, with a pillow behind him for additional comfort, watching with rapt attention as Wylan’s soft, pink lips kissed their way down his stomach, teasing his navel, exploring the hollows inside his hip bones. They haven't had the opportunity to be intimate together onboard the ship, and that day and a half at sea, surviving only on quick pecks and hugs, had felt like weeks of starvation.

Jesper threw his head back against the headboards’ metal bars and he buried his fingers in chestnut curls when Wylan took him into his mouth. There was no way something that felt this good was lawful and allowed, but then again, Jesper was a criminal and didn't bother much with the legality of things. Moreover, the sensation of Wylan's fingers digging into his thighs in an effort to keep them still, and spreaded, was a feeling Jesper doubted he could ever get used to, or forsake.

When Wylan released him, some delicious minutes later, Jesper heaved a long sigh of gratitude for the pleasure given to him, and also regret at the loss of Wylan's perfect mouth around him.

“You're so…” Jesper whispered, struggling to find the words as Wylan climbed into his lap and straddled his hips. He stroked his boyfriend's flanks with as much affection as one could give, his hands trembling in anticipation for what was to come.

Wylan didn't need Jesper to form a complete thought to know exactly how he felt. “So are you.” He smiled and kissed him. “Stay right there,” he then instructed.

“I'm not going anywhere, sweetheart,” Jesper assured him, helping Wylan position himself in the right angle to be penetrated. ”I'm all yours.”

Wylan’s legs and stomach quivered, breathy gasps escaping him as he sunk down onto Jesper little by little. Jesper kissed his collarbone, whispering encouraging words against his skin. Soon enough, Wylan was bracing himself on his shoulders, eyes glassy, giving his consent for Jesper to move with a quick nod.

Coupling in this position wasn't quite far from a dance, and Jesper had the skill and stamina required to make it happen….and to make it last. He supported Wylan around the waist, hand grasping at his arse, meeting his movements with upward thrusts, each and everyone of them pulling all sorts of delightful sounds from the gorgeous young man above him.

Nothing in the world could compare, however, to the sensation of Wylan finally reaching his peak around him. It drove Jesper across the edge as he barrelled through his own orgasm, his heart hammering in his chest with the pride of having pleased his man.

When Jesper lowered a boneless Wylan onto the bed sheet carefully, he looked properly, divinely debauched ; Sankt Wylan, the patron saint of chemistry, music, kindness and perfect blowjobs. His boyfriend ; his Wylan : the man he loved. Because Jesper was in love with him. That much was clear. He wasn't sure if he was ready to express those feelings with words, however, but perhaps, he could let his actions speak for him. “Are you thirsty?” he asked, nuzzling at the damp hair on Wylan's temple.

“Ghezen, yes,” Wylan replied, still a bit out of breath. “This is thirsty work.”

A voice echoed through Jesper's thoughts. “You'll be head over heels before the month is over.” Give or take a couple of days, that prediction had proven to be right. “Damn you, Poppy,” Jesper cursed his friend in his mind, with a smile floating on his lips. He jumped out of bed and pulled a pair of trousers on. “What about I head to the kitchen to make us some tea? We could drink it in bed?” He grabbed the nearest piece of garment he could wear to cover his chest while he'd go downstairs, which turned out to be a tweed waistcoat hanging on the back of a chair.

“No! You bought the stroopwafels earlier. Let me do it,” Wylan protested, scrambling into his underwear and the buttoned-up shirt that had ended up under one of the pillows. “I make a mean brew, I promise.”

“You’re aware this is my shirt, right?” Jesper told him with a smirk and a raised eyebrow.

“Yes, I'm fully aware,” Wylan replied, giving him a brilliant, unapologetic smile over his shoulder before he slipped out the door and into the hallway; bare feet, hair a mess, and more handsome than Jesper could handle.

Finding himself alone in a quiet bedroom, Jesper went to the window and he pulled the curtains aside, throwing a look down at the street. The wind and rain had picked up after sunset and Barkenstraat was mostly deserted, except from a black carriage parked across the street. Jesper sat on the windowsill and did something he hadn't done in a long while. He simply watched rain falling over his city at night ; water trickling down the roofs, from the gutters and onto the cobblestones in long, shiny, silvery threads.

“Well, thank you very much, good sir,” Jesper said, when Wylan stepped back into the room, carrying two steaming cups. “Although, after I've seen you concoct that firepox compound, I'm not sure I should let you make my tea,” he teased with a wink, accepting the cup Wylan was handing out for him.

Wylan settled back in bed, assuming a sitting position that allowed him to cradle his mug with both hands and take a careful sip. “What are you afraid of? That I've put poison in it?”

“No. But what if you spiked it with some powerful aphrodisiac that makes me lose my mind, though?”

“I know for a fact you don't need aphrodisiacs, Jesper. It would be overkill at that point,” Wylan deadpanned.

Jesper brushed it off with a chuckle, and moved to the bed where he made himself comfortable at Wylan’s side, putting an arm around his shoulders. The warmth of the bed, the bounce of the mattress, his man’s presence by his side, the pattering of the rain on the glass window; it was all just so nice. “It is good to be home,” he reiterated for the umpteenth time.

“You keep saying that,” Wylan pointed out.

“It hasn't worn off! Look, I like saving the world as much as anyone else : the fame, the fortune, especially the fortune...”

Wylan threw a vague look at the room around them and gave a small shrug. “It is nicer than the tannery, ” he conceded.

Jesper pinched his lips at the implications. It appeared Wylan had been deprived of basic comfort for a long while, both emotional and material, and Jesper hated the very thought of it. He had this impulse to wrap Wylan in a cozy bubble, in which he could protect him from the outside world, at least until the next job, the next heist, the next rush.

“You know, Ketterdam has never been that welcoming to me,” Wylan confessed, staring down at the bottom of his tea cup, as if he could read his past in the tea leaves. “It has never really felt like home.”

It made Jesper's throat tighten some more. Almost on instinct, without truly rationalizing any of it, he took one of the metal game tokens lying on the nightstand.

“But the Crows need their demo man,” Wylan declared, perking up ever so slightly and wiggling his shoulders to adjust his position, “and there's no one better than me. So of course I came back.”

Jesper smiled, pleased to be quoted, but the last thing he wanted was for Wylan to regret having returned to Ketterdam. He had to give him a better reason to stay; a reason for happiness. He squeezed his fist around the game token, as the telltale warmth and prickling of his durast powers coursed through his muscle fibers, bones and veins. “What if it did feel more like home?” he suggested, taking a leap of faith and handing whatever he had fabrikated to Wylan.

“Oh,” Wylan breathed, taking the small, metal object carefully between his thumb and forefinger, as if Jesper had just entrusted him one of the crown's jewels. “What's this?” he asked softly. “Is that a coat hook?”

Embarrassed by a creation so misshapen his boyfriend could not even identify it, Jesper jumped out of bed and fled to the foot of it in shame. “Ah, forget it! Forget it!”

“No wait!” Wylan tried to hold him back. “Oh! It was a key,” he then realized.

“Yes,” Jesper confirmed, leaning against the footboard awkwardly.

“What does it open?”

Jesper took a long, deep breath; on the verge of another leap of faith. He was going to be an expert diver by the end of the night. “This room.”

Wylan’s eyes lit up like a thousand candles. If the key was a crown jewel, Jesper was Ghezen himself right now. Wylan swallowed, overcome with emotion. “This is the kindest thing that anyone has ever done for me.” Sadly enough, Jesper believed him.

Despite the fact that awestruck, adoring Wylan was probably one of the prettiest things Jesper had ever seen in his twenty-five years of life, he still had to ask for confirmation: “Is that… a yes?”

“Yes, yes I will move in with you!” Wylan exclaimed, shifting onto his knees on the bed, fervent and hasty, perhaps afraid Jesper would change his mind. Jesper, of course, had no intention of taking his offer back, but the urge to tease was stronger than him.

“Oh, that suddenly sounds very official,” Jesper reflected in mock-hesitation, but he was already kneeling on the bed as well and shuffling closer to get the embrace he suspected was coming, “and now that you've said that, I'm not so su–” As expected, Wylan grabbed his face and silenced him with a kiss. Jesper melted into it, despite Wylan almost crushing his cheeks between his hands in his hurry to show his gratitude.

When Wylan pulled back, the hazel of his eyes was still filled to the brim with wonderment, but there was some carefulness in there as well, and some measure of doubt. “Is it true, though?” Wylan asked. “Do you really want me to live here with you? Is that what the key means?”

Jesper carded his fingers through the curls at the nape of Wylan's neck, scratching the base of his skull affectionately. “Yes, Mpenzi. I'm happy if you consider this room your room, and if the Slat becomes your home, and–” He didn't have the time to finish that thought, because Wylan was kissing him again, the doubt and tension having evaporated from his lithe frame. His whole body felt alight with happiness when Jesper looped his arms around him and pressed their chests together.

Wylan pulled back just enough to be able to say : “I will go to the workshop tomorrow and pack my things.” He was almost vibrating with excitement.

“I’m glad we're on the same page about this, although you seem determined not to let me finish any of my senten–”

Another kiss forced Jesper to silence.

“I just wanted to sa–”

Wylan's mouth claimed Jesper's once more. “Less speaking ; more touching,” he then ordered, pushing the waistcoat off Jesper’s shoulders and tossing it off the bed.

Lady Luck had never favored Jesper at the card table, but she certainly had been kind to him regarding affairs of the heart recently, because Wylan was Ghezen-sent. Jesper pushed him into the pillows, playful and wanting. “I'm going to take that back, thank you very much,” he told Wylan, pulling the borrowed shirt over his head as his boyfriend giggled, happy to be undressed and touched by someone he trusted.

This time around, the raw, urgent passion in both of them had somehow abated, leaving way to tenderness and sensuality. Jesper took his sweet time to explore the smooth, silky plain of Wylan's chest and stomach with his lips, and then, he made love to him, the fingers of his left hand laced with Wylan's on the pillow above his head and their eyes locked, eagerly foraging for love and connection in the other's gaze like hungry creatures. And yet, Wylan's own fingers on Jesper's back we're gentle and light, like pale-winged butterflies. If love could kill, Jesper would probably die.

Once Wylan had had his fill of pleasure, he fell asleep with his back tucked to Jesper's chest.

The weather outside had taken a turn for the worst, and the rain storm was beating the roof of the Slat with heavy gusts of wind. Yet, Jesper relished in the idea that he contributed to keeping his boyfriend safe from the elements, or any other threat for that matter, by simply holding him. Jesper couldn't find sleep, however. The fate of Dhòmhnaill and the others; them being hounded by the Stadwatch, still gnawed at his conscience. Jan Van Eck certainly had the means to bribe the city's officers and apply the full force of the law on these innocents. Jesper thought none of them deserved to end up in Hellgate.

Gently, slowly, Jesper let go of his boyfriend's sleep-warm body and slipped out of bed.

“Jes… stay, please…,” Wylan mumbled, halfway between dreams and consciousness.

“I won't be long, love,” Jesper promised, “you can go back to sleep.”

“No,” Wylan protested weakly.

Jesper fetched a clean pair of slacks and a shirt from the closet. Out of reflex more than true necessity, he strapped his belt with holsters and revolvers around his waist.

Wylan was already asleep again when Jesper tucked him under the duvet and brushed a kiss to the crown of his head.

Not two minutes later, Jesper was knocking on the door of Kaz’s office, and was unsurprised to find him sitting at his desk, going over papers and ledgers despite the late hour. With Inej being away, Kaz’s insomnia was only bound to get worse. There were bags under his eyes already and under the flickering light of the single oil lamp, he seemed to have aged ten years. Jesper wondered how he even managed to read anything in such darkness.

“Do you have anything on that big shot Councilman; Jan Van Eck?” Jesper cut straight to the chase, sitting across from Kaz on the other side of the sturdy oak desk.

“Depends. Why are you asking?” Kaz inquired with his trademark frown, but Jesper could tell, by the way he was leaning forward ever so slightly that the question had intrigued him.

“I was hoping there was some way you could help those poor sods,” Jesper explained, taking the Stadwatch poster out of his pocket and doing his best to flatten it over the desk, and positioning it so Kaz could read.

“And why would I do that?”

“Because Wylan and I are kind of implicated.” Jesper ran a hand thought his hair. “The property damage at the Green Dragon ; it was one of Wylan’s bombs. And I shot a constable's finger off.”

Kaz scoffed. “I thought you'd be able to keep your boyfriend in check, but it seems I was wrong.”

“He's a grown man! I don't need to keep him in check!” Jesper protested. “Besides, he did that to help people escape the Stadwatch. He did a good thing.”

“And now you want me to ….do what, exactly? Blackmail Van Eck? The judges? Make the charges go away? Who do you think I am, exactly?”

“Ah! I don't know. It was worth a try,” Jesper sighed, taking the poster back. “I thought maybe you knew something compromising about him; some secrets Inej might have gathered.”

Kaz linked his ungloved hands together, smooth but pale as death from the lack of exposure to daylight. “I have intel on everyone sitting at the Council.”

“That’s what I thought.” Jesper leaned back into his chair and propped his feet up on the desk, earning himself a disapproving look which he promptly chose to ignore. “So? What kind of skeletons are there in Van Eck’s closet?”

“I know for a fact those skeletons are very much alive,” Kaz said, cryptic, “But I'm afraid I can't waste this advantage on helping your kaelish friends.” He stood and walked up to the window. “Now that Pekka Rollins’ gone, the only obstacle standing in my way for the total control of Fifth Harbor is Jan Van Eck,” Kaz explained, his eyes on the street below. “He and Pekka had some sort of deal, apparently. That’s what I learned from the books that we stole from the accountant's office.”

Jesper pulled out one of his guns. He twirled it once, then twice as he thought. “Taking Rollins down was one thing; he’s a gangster; a Barrel rat like the rest of us,” he observed, “But Van Eck? That’s a different ball game altogether. He rolls in way higher circles.”

“I know that, but you're an experienced gambler, Jesper. You must know by now that it's not the fortune of your opponents that counts so much as the cards in your own hand,” Kaz replied, but he seemed distracted by something outside. “Have you noticed the carriage that’s been parked on the street for the last two hours or so?

“Yes. What about it?”

“I think we should expect some visitors tonight,” Kaz stated, walking back towards his desk to grab a pistol from one of the drawers. “Where’s Wylan?”

Alarmed by Kaz arming himself, Jesper put his feet down from the desk and stood. “He's asleep in my bed. Why?”

Kaz checked the gun's magazine and found it fully loaded. “Good.”

And this is when the doorknob started vibrating. Kaz and Jesper both pointed their weapons at the door. It wasn't an earthquake, because the floor itself was immobile. But then, the faded paintings representing Kerch countryside landscapes started rattling on the walls as well. “What the hell is this?” Jesper groaned between clenched teeth. “What's happening?”

Kaz said nothing, and cocked the hammer of his pistol. Jesper imitated him.

A shadow emerged through the wall at Jesper's right. “A ghost,” was the only thought his brain could conjure up, before something hard hit him over the head and he lost consciousness.

Chapter Text

By now, Wylan had slept often enough next to Jesper to know that he wasn't a quiet sleeper to say the least. He'd grunt, groan, and speak too; most of the time in Zemeni, but with kerch words mixed in as well. He'd have whole, unintelligible monologues for minutes on end in the middle of the night.

Jesper never slept still either ; tossing and turning in an endless loop. Sometimes, he'd spin so much in his sleep that Wylan was afraid he'd strangle himself with the bedsheets. And Jesper always had to have some part of himself touching Wylan ; whether it was a hand, his toes, or an elbow.

Wylan didn't mind any of it. It was such a refreshing change from anything else he's had so far in his life. At the Geldstraat, he slept in a bed too wide for one person, in a bedroom that always felt too big, in a mansion too vast and devoid of warmth to bring him any sense of comfort. And then, he ended up in the Barrel, all alone, in a narrow hammock, in the middle of a cramped, humid, dark apartment. Compared to either of those situations, sleeping next to a squirmy, talkative gunslinger was ten times better.

In fact, it’s the lack of touches, movements, and occasional noises from Jesper’s side of the bed; it's the uneasiness of everything having been so still and quiet for a while that stirred Wylan from slumber.

He stretched an arm to his left, as far across the mattress as he could manage, but his hand failed to meet any sleep-warm skin underneath the duvet. He rubbed his eyes. Despite the light of the streetlamps filtering through the curtains, he couldn't distinguish anything in the room with clarity . “Jes?” he called out softly. No response.

Wylan could have gone back to sleep, trusting that Jesper would be back at some point, but a nagging feeling of “something’s not right” kept rolling in his stomach like a powder keg. He groped around the nightstand before his fingers found a lighter. The oil lamp, however, refused to cooperate. Jesper might have left it on when he went out of the room, and now, it had run out of fuel. This also meant Jesper had been gone for a while. The powder keg in Wylan's stomach made another couple of ominous rolls.

He had more success with the other bedside lamp and the wicker lit with a small hissing noise. Stark naked, carrying the lamp, Wylan stood from the bed with a shiver and walked up to the cold fireplace. The mantle clock indicated almost five bells in the morning. “Ghezen,” he cursed under his breath. Jesper had been gone for more than four hours at that point. Had he snuck out to go to a gambling den somewhere in the Barrel? The temptation of spending his recently acquired fortune might have been too much to resist in the end. If that was the case, in all likelihood, he was going to resurface in the morning: hungover and sheepish.

And yet, something didn't sit right with Wylan. Jesper's belt and revolvers were gone, but his boots were still exactly where he had tossed them; along the wall by the door. The call of the Makker’s Wheel might be strong, Jesper still wasn't crazy enough to go out in the streets barefoot in the rain. And if he had gone downstairs to play a couple games of cards, he’d be back, given that the club had been closed for two hours already.

Going through the few clothes Inej had rescued from the old Crow Club, Wylan found one of his boyfriend's shirts, a dark red one. He put it on and threw his demo vest and his coat over it. If Jesper had armed himself to go wherever he needed to go, Wylan might as well bring the emergency chemicals he kept in his vest’s pockets at all times. Contrary to Jesper, though, he put his shoes on and tied them carefully.

The hallway outside Jesper's room was just as quiet. He tried the bathroom across the hall, but the door was unlocked, and there was nobody there.

On his way downstairs, he called out his boyfriend’s name a few times, as loud as the early hour and decency allowed. He truly didn't want to have to face a night robe clad, scowling, displeased Kaz apparition. But the whole house was eerily silent; too silent, even for an hour at which all the employees and patrons had gone home.

And yet, when Wylan reached the barroom downstairs, he spotted candlelight reflecting on one of the walls. Upon making his way across the room, he found Nina sitting alone at one of the tables. She had her hand wrapped around the neck of a whisky bottle, with no glass in sight, her head hung forward. When Wylan approached, she lifted her chin and he could see tears and make-up trailing down her cheeks to her chin. Her eyes were puffy and her cheeks red.

“Oh… Nina…” he breathed, putting down the lamp on the table. He pulled a chair to sit close to her. “What happened?”

She didn't reply. Instead, she took a swig from the bottle and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.

“Matthias didn't come back with you, did he?” Wylan ventured, aware that this necessary question was perhaps going to make things worse.

“No, everything went wrong. Pekka Rollins was there,” she recounted, blinking rapidly as if the dim light of the sole candle was too much to bear. “Then, the wolves arrived, and Matthias didn't want to hurt them. So he killed a guard, and then, I knew the letter was useless.”

Wylan couldn't make heads or tails of Nina’s account of the events at Hellgate, but obviously, her failure to free Matthias had distressed her and he felt powerless to offer any meaningful comfort. “I'm so sorry, Nina,” he still said, feeling the inadequacy of it.

She coughed and cleared her throat, in an effort to swallow her grief. “It’s alright, Wy. Well, I mean, it’s not alright; nothing feels right, but it doesn't matter now. What's done is done and–” She paused, then lifted her eyebrows, as if she truly took in Wylan’s presence for the first time. “What are you still doing out of bed at this hour?” She pinched at the red fabric over his arm. "Is that Jesper’s shirt?” The sleeves were too long and the shoulder seams too wide to have been tailored for Wylan's stature.

“I was looking for him, actually,” Wylan admitted.

“You two really need to keep better track of one another.”

“Have you seen him?”

“No. I thought he was with you.”

Wylan rubbed his forearms in a self-soothing gesture. “He got out of bed around midnight. He told me he was going to be back right away. When I woke up, he was still gone. It's been hours. I have a bad feeling.”

Nina lifted her chin and looked at the ceiling, like a bloodhound on alert. “He’s in the house, though,” she observed.

“How can you–” Wylan began to ask, before he remembered who exactly he was speaking to. “Oh. Wait. Can you hear his heartbeat?”

“Yes,” she confirmed, still concentrating on the sound, which Wylan had no hope to be able to detect, “but now that you mention it, it’s…strangely faint. I can't even tell if he’s on the second or third floor.” She rose to her feet swiftly, and Wylan imitated her, his heart pounding in his ears all of a sudden. If Nina thought there was ground for worry, it meant things were even worse than Wylan had anticipated.

“You search the second floor, and I search the third?” Nina suggested, already heading for the staircase.

“Yes, okay,” Wylan agreed.

He was out of breath when he reached the second floor, not from exertion, but from the strength of his worry. He already knew there was no one in the bathroom, but he threw all of the other doors open one by one, calling out for Jesper. He looked into closets, under beds, with his stomach in his throat, in a frantic, twisted game of hide and seek.

When he got to Kaz's office and tried the doorknob, his heart dropped. It was the only one on this floor that was locked. “Kaz?!! Jes?!! Jesper!!” Wylan shouted out, hitting the door with both fists. Nobody spoke inside, and nothing moved. There was light, however, and a sliver of it came underneath the door and illuminated the tips of his shoes. “Open up, please! Jesper!! Kaz?!” Still nothing. He was now convinced his boyfriend was in there ; wounded, maybe even agonizing in a pool of his own blood. Wylan was like an underwater volcano about to erupt; he wanted to scream, cry, and vomit all at once. He couldn't do any of those things, however. He had to keep a clear head ; find a solution ; a way to get to Jesper.

“Stop and think” he urged himself. “Think well, but think quickly.” His mind had to speed up to full capacity, like a locomotive with a loaded firebox, but it had to stay on tracks no matter what. “Train tracks! That's it!” Wylan kneeled to the floor, set the oil lamp aside and unbuttoned his vest in a hurry. He emptied his pockets of their content ; vials, pouches, powder envelopes and tools, until he found them: iron oxide powder and copper turnings.

“Thermite,” Wylan whispered. Builders used thermite to weld train tracks to one another. The recipe was simple ; only two ingredients, but once the powder and turnings were mixed together and set aflame, they produced a localized explosion with enough heat to make metal melt. The thermite would do a lot of damage on a simple brass lock.

Hands shaking, Wylan opened the envelope containing iron oxide, dropped the content into the one with the copper turnings, and shook the mix with frenzied vigor. Then, he shuffled closer to the door, holding his breath as he poured the powder into the keyhole by giving small flicks to the paper envelope to make the content slide out of it. “Come on, come on, come on,” he urged, as the powder entered little by little into the keyhole. He should have measured and weighed the ingredients. Too little thermite, and the molten copper would block the lock instead of melting it. Too much of the compound and the door could catch fire, endangering the whole house and everyone inside.

He didn't have time for precautions. In fact, he didn't even put his goggles on as he stuffed a cotton wick into the keyhole and ignited it with a match. He still somewhat valued his life and his face, because he scurried away further down the corridor with the oil lamp, praying that Jesper was far enough from the door not to get hurt in the process.

Four seconds later, blue fire roared out of the keyhole and around the doorknob, reddening and deforming the metal. It lasted for another five seconds as flames licked the wood with a strange wheezing sound, until it receded.

Carefully, Wylan approached, coughing from the smoke. He could hardly believe it had worked, and that the door had just been blackened by the reaction instead of catching fire, but he had no time to congratulate himself on a demo job well done.

The doorknob was crooked and probably still scalding hot, so Wylan didn't even try to reach for it. He gave the door a strong kick and the whole latch gave. Kaz would be furious, for sure, but he’d deal with his boss’ agro later.

There was some smoke inside the office as well, but it rapidly dissipated.

Wylan’s heart dropped to his feet and further, a taste of bile filling his mouth. Jesper was on the floor, on his back, motionless, his guns lying at his sides, like a soldier who had fallen in the midst of battle. “Jes!!!” Wylan cried out, strangled by fear. He hurried to his boyfriend’s side and fell to his knees. Jesper’s eyes were closed and he had no reaction whatsoever when Wylan called out his name. “Jesper, do you hear me!? Jesper!!” Wylan wailed, grasping at the lapels of his waistcoat and shaking him helplessly. Jesper remained limp and unresponsive. Footsteps came running up the hallway. “Nina!!!! I found him!!”

“What's going on?” she asked, emerging through the doorway and taking in the scene.

“I can't wake him up!!!” Wylan sobbed. Somewhere along the way, he had started crying, because his face was bathed in tears. “Something happened to him! I don't know what! Please do something! Please help him!”

She kneeled on the rough floorboards, across from Wylan and on Jesper’s other side. She laid her hands over his chest. “He’s alive and breathing,” Nina confirmed, eyebrows furrowed. “And he doesn't appear to be hurt. It’s almost as if he’s sleeping…very deeply.”

“Can you do anything for him!? I tried to shake him, but it’s like he can't hear me at all!”

“Move aside!” Nina ordered. “I’ll try something.”

Wylan shuffled back, keeping his anxious stare glued to Jesper’s face, looking for any change. “What are you doing?” he asked, as Nina made some complicated hand motions over Jesper’s ribcage.

“Accelerating his pulse ; bringing more blood to his brain. I've good news for you; he does have a brain,” she commented, in order to lighten the mood.

Wylan was too scared to heed any of it. He couldn't lose Jesper. Not like this. Not ever. The idea that he would never hear the sound of Jesper's voice, endure another one of his flirty innuendos, see any of his easy smiles or feel his eager touch on his skin : that was a fate he refused to contemplate. The world could not move on without Jesper Fahey.

“It’s not…working…” Nina said after two minutes of attempts, panting and straining, sweat shining at the base of her throat. Some droplets had started to pearl on Jesper's forehead as well, but he was as unconscious as before. “Whatever this is, it's resisting my powers.”

“I think I have an idea,” Wylan declared, jumping up onto his feet. His legs felt weak and wobbly from the sheer amount of adrenaline, but they were somehow able to carry him to Jesper's bedroom, where he grabbed his satchel.

When Wylan was younger, his father would sometimes lock him inside the study all night long, having him copy the same sentence over and over again until the sun rose. Jan would walk in every three hours or so, to check that his son hadn't fallen asleep at the desk, and if he had, he would jolt Wylan awake with a whiff of strong smelling salts. The scent was imprinted, branded in Wylan's memory forever. Even now, as an adult, the smell of sulfur elicited such a strong reaction he sometimes gagged if he caught a scent even vaguely reminiscent of it.

Nina was still kneeling at Jesper’s side, helpless, but she was holding his brown-skinned hand in her pale one, her other hand stroking Jesper’s forehead. “He’s still sleeping just as deeply,” she announced as Wylan put his satchel down to the floor next to Jesper and started rummaging through it. For the second time tonight, Wylan prayed in silence while his hands and brain worked in tandem to prepare a chemical compound. He prayed to Ghezen, but also to Alina, and all of Inej’s other saints that this would work.

The smelling salts he concocted would be potent ; more potent than anything Jan had ever used on him. Wylan’s nausea rose in his throat, but he pushed it down. No. For Jesper’s sake ; he had to get through this. He corked the vial containing the various ingredients and shook it in his palm.

He uncorked it carefully and approached it to Jesper’s nostrils.

The reaction was violent and immediate. Jesper’s whole body was agitated by a tremor and he sprung awake, sitting up in a hurry, face flushed and eyes wide. “Saints!!! That’s absolutely rancid!” he exclaimed.

Wylan almost dropped the vial in his hurry to throw his arms around Jesper’s neck and hug him. He sobbed into his shoulder for a good minute, shaking with relief, as Jesper was just holding him, too stunned and confused to say a word just yet.

“Don't do that to me ever again, Jes!” Wylan demanded as he pulled away. “Never!!”

“I'm so sorry,” Jesper breathed, rubbing Wylan’s back to comfort him. “But what did I do exactly? Why am I on the floor?”

“I thought you'd be able to tell us that,” Nina remarked.

Jesper looked up at her and noticed her smudged eyeliner. “Aww. Were you crying for me too, darling?”

“Of course not!” she protested, crossing her arms.

As Wylan let go of him, Jesper reached for the back of his own head, tentatively, then looked at his dry fingers, puzzled. “Someone hit me over the head, but… There's no blood, no swelling, no bruise, nothing.”

“Who hit you?” Wylan asked.

Jesper threw a glance around the room, taking a few seconds to take in his surroundings. “I've no idea,” he confessed, then pointed at the wall decorated with old-fashioned landscape paintings. “They came through that wall.”

Nina raised an eyebrow. “Through the wall?”

“Yes.”

“I think you got knocked out harder than you thought,” she remarked. “People don't come in through walls, Jesper.”

“I know that,” he groaned, frustrated, “but I saw what I saw.” Jesper threw another look around the office, as if looking for something that should be there and yet wasn't. “Wait a minute… where's Kaz?”

Wylan put his hand over Jesper’s forearm. “Was he with you?”

“Yes he was!”

“He’s not here,” Nina informed him. “He's not in the house. I don't hear his pulse anywhere. There’s just the three of us here, and a couple rats.”

Jesper stared at the door, his gaze blackening to the point of matching the soot from the thermite explosion. “He took him…”

“Who?” Nina asked.

“Van Eck. Jan Van Eck,” Jesper hissed with conviction. “He took Kaz.”

Blood drained from Wylan's face.

Jesper tried to scramble up to his feet, but Nina pulled him back down. “Easy there, Jes. If you stand too quickly, you'll pass out.”

He huffed like a scolded child, but obeyed her. The restlessness had taken a new hold on him, however, and he collected his guns from the floor, playing and fidgeting with the triggers in a way that made Wylan even more nervous than he already was. “I know it's him ; I know Van Eck's responsible for this,” he repeated.

“Van Eck. I've heard that name before,” Nina reflected, then turned her gaze to Wylan, which he didn't like at all. “Wasn't that the name you were saying, when you woke up from your datura meloxia trip?”

It was as if someone had poured thermite down Wylan's airways and set fire to it. “I don't know. I don't remember,” he said, half-choking on his own lie, so much so that the words came out in a barely audible way.

“You called out for someone named Wylan Van Eck,” Nina insisted, her frown deepening.

That was it ; the moment Wylan had been dreading for weeks, if not months. Jesper had turned to him as well, scrutinizing Wylan’s face with a frown very much like Nina’s. “What does that mean?”

Wylan was that mouse he had found in a cupboard when he was seven, its hind legs caught in a snap trap, broken, unusable. The rodent was still alive and fighting even if there was no point in doing it anymore. Just like that mouse, the injured, condemned animal in Wylan refused to accept its life was over. “Like I said! I don't remember!” he protested, his voice high-pitched in barely veiled panic. ‘’I was drugged! I was just rambling!”

Nina stared at him, her eyes narrowed in suspicion. She could tell. Of course she could tell he was lying; she was a heartrender. At the Cumulus, Van Leuween always put Vanda behind the bar, so no one was suspecting her, but she could identify cheaters from across the room just from the way their pulse sped up at certain points of the games. Wylan's own heart wanted to come out of his mouth, and he was directly in Nina's line of sight. Only one question remained ; was she going to call him out on it?

Something flashed in Nina's stormy grey eyes as she reached an unspoken conclusion. “I think we all need to calm down!” she decided, before Jesper could ask more questions. She stood and dusted the front of her tartan skirt. “We should all sit in the kitchen and gather our wits around a cup of tea and some snacks.” She extended a hand to help Jesper up.

Jesper stood with some difficulty. “We don't have time for that! We have to find Kaz!” he reiterated, staggering and grasping at Wylan's sleeve to stay upright.

“You're dehydrated, and your blood pressure is still low,” Nina declared, her tone firm and not leaving any room for further protest. “You can barely stand on your legs and you look like a newborn flamingo that's just hatched. What good will you be if you faint in the middle of the street?” She gestured toward the door Wylan had kicked open. “Come downstairs. Drink and eat something. I'm not asking : I'm ordering.”

“Oh saint!” Jesper said with a snort and a roll of his eyes. “Okay, mom!”

Fifteen minutes later, the three of them were sitting on stools around the kitchen counter as the kettle hissed on the gas stove. Nina had found a tin of ginger biscuits in the cupboard, and it lay open between the three of them. Jesper had already engulfed at least five biscuits, but Wylan simply couldn't eat. Not a single crumb would get past the tightness of his throat and the lump in it that felt the size of a boulder. Ginger would be no help for the kind of dread-induced nausea that seized him. He sat straight on his stool, spine stiff and shoulder muscles bunched up with tension.

“So, let's start at the beginning,” Nina decided, resting her forearms over the surface of the counter. “Who's that Van Eck guy?

Jesper pulled a face. “Jan Van Eck is one of the wealthiest merchants in Ketterdam, and also a racist arsehole who's exploiting immigrants so he can get richer. He probably spreads the blood, sweat, and tears of his employees on his toasts in the morning.”

Wylan wrung his hands and twisted his fingers to the point of pain under the edge of the counter. “Good riddance,” Jesper had once said, regarding the supposed demise of Jan Van Eck’s spawn. For his greatest shame and misery, Wylan was that unfortunate spawn, and one naive enough to think he still had a chance to escape it all.

Nina threw him a quick glance, but thankfully, she didn't comment on his fidgeting. “He sounds like a pleasant fellow,” she said instead, tone dripping in sarcasm, “but that doesn't explain what he wants with Kaz.”

“He's sitting on the Council and basically owns the city,” Jesper explained, shoving another biscuit into his mouth. He didn't wait to swallow it before he continued. “He's been trying to clean the Barrel for ages, calling it a den of sin, while being utterly corrupted himself. During the week or so before we left for Shu Han, I kept seeing carriages from the Van Eck Enterprises everywhere. For a moment, I thought they might have been following me, or us, but then I brushed it off as me being paranoid because of the Rollins situation. Now I think I was on to something. I reckon Van Eck's been planning something against us for a while; I'm not sure why. It might have something to do with the illegal kaelish party Wylan and I attended, but it doesn't quite track, because, in all likeness, he had been keeping an eye on us even before then.” He had to interrupt himself long enough to allow Nina to retrieve the kettle and pour the boiling water into the teapot.

“According to Kaz, Van Eck had some sort of deal with Pekka Rollins for the control of Fifth Harbor,” Jesper continued, “so that might be because of it. Van Eck must have figured out we were moving against Pekka when the Crow Club exploded, and he wanted to know who was going to get the upper hand.”

“Or maybe he was looking for me, following me, waiting for the right moment to get rid of me for good”, Wylan thought. He was so on edge that he jumped and almost jerked away when Jesper reached over and put a hand on his knee.

“Wylan, there's something I've been meaning to tell you today,” he confessed, a guilty look on his face. “The bomb you set off at the Green Dragon, well, the brewery building belonged to Van Eck. He’s the one who set the reward for information.”

Wylan had thought him being revealed as belonging to the Van Eck family was the only and worst thing that could happen to him, but he realized how wrong he had been when the reality of it dawned on him. “The Stadwatch is looking for me,” he breathed out in a faint, shaky whisper. He didn't know the Green Dragon belonged to his father ; had no idea how many buildings he owned or rented out in the city. He wasn't privy to his father's business deals, and would probably never have been, given that he’d been discounted as an ineligible heir.

“Listen, love,” Jesper said softly, squeezing Wylan's knee in reassurance, “I know this is scary, but I wouldn't let anything happen to you; I hope you know that.” His warm brown eyes were earnest, protective.

His words didn't have the desired effect on Wylan, however, as he was spiraling down in a vortex of guilt. “Dhòmhnaill, Rory, the others. They've all been arrested because of me.”

“The property damage contributed to the severity of the charges, that's true,” Jesper conceded, his thumb rubbing circles around Wylan’s kneecap through the fabric of his trousers, “but you’re not responsible for organizing the céilí. The people who were there knew the risks.”

Wylan didn't deserve any of his boyfriend’s solicitude; any of his loyalty, care or concern. He couldn't lie any longer. He owed Jesper the truth, even if he suspected it was going to break them apart. He dug his nails into his palms. “Jes…I hope you can forgive me.”

“There’s nothing to forgive, Wy.”

Shaking his head with vigor, Wylan tried to catch his breath, as if he had been running all the way to the Geldstraat and back. “Yes, yes there is.” His hands were freezing, deprived of circulation. Cold sweat dampened the curls at the back of his neck. He had to say it before he lost courage. He had his eyes fixated on his own trembling fingers. He could not look at Jesper's face anymore. He parted his lips, but found himself tongue-tied, and before he could actually push any sound out of his mouth, someone with a low, gravelly voice cleared their throat from the kitchen doorframe.

“I hope you’ve been enjoying your tea party,” Kaz said, “because we’ve got work to do.”

Jesper was the first to snap out of their collective startlement. “Kaz!! Ghezen! Where have you been?”

“What happened!?” Nina added, as curious as the others to know where he had disappeared all night.

Kaz looked a bit wild-eyed and rough, and like he hadn't gotten a wink of sleep, but they all had seen worse versions of their boss before. He ignored their questions. Instead, he turned on his heels and the thud of his cane receded down the short hallway leading to the club’s barroom. He just assumed they'd all follow.

“I hate it when he does that,” Nina grunted, but she stood from her stool anyway and headed out of the kitchen, as did the others.

The velvet curtains of the barroom had been drawn open and Wylan blinked in the sudden brightness. The sun had risen while they were huddled in conspiracy in the dark kitchen.

Kaz climbed the three steps leading to the bar, like a politician climbing on a tribune to give a speech. “You three; an opportunity has presented itself: the most lucrative job we've ever taken.” Greed and grim excitement glimmered in his icy blue eyes.

Perking up to attention, Jesper took three steps forward, eager not to miss any detail.

“There is a new weapon about to hit the market,” Kaz went on. “If it does, it could make the destruction of the Shadow Fold seem like a spring picnic.”

Kaz Brekker wasn't prone to exaggeration, as far as Wylan knew, at least not for this sort of thing. That certainly didn't sound good.

“What kind of weapon?” Nina asked with some skepticism.

“It's a drug called Jurda Parem, highly addictive, and if Grisha take it, their power is amplified a thousand times over,” Kaz explained. “The chemist who created it fled to Kerch once he'd realized what he'd done, but the Fjerdans caught him. He now awaits trial. If the Fjerdans weaponize this drug, the consequences would be unimaginable. Everything we've ever known, every strength we've relied upon, shattered.” He casted a sharp stare at every member of his crew. “Any questions?”

Wylan said nothing, rubbing the underside of his chin with his knuckles in discomfort.

“Yeah, I have several questions,” Nina intervened.

“Me too,” Jesper echoed. “How much does that job pay, for starters?”

“Thirty million kruge.”

Jesper coughed. “Sorry? For a moment, I thought you just said thirty million kruge.”

“That's exactly what I've said,” Kaz confirmed, making his cane roll in his hand.

“Who has that sort of money?” Jesper asked, squinting as if blinded by the potential glitter of all that gold.

“Jan Van Eck.”

On instinct, Jesper’s fingers sought the handles of his revolvers. “That tracks,” he grunted.

Wylan’s blood ran cold once again. Every time someone uttered his father’s name, his own last name, Wylan felt a stab right through his nervous system. He hunched over himself like a wilting tree leaf, wishing the floor would swallow him and that everyone in this room would forget he even existed.

Nina gave a distracted spin to the Makker’s Wheel on the table behind her. “And what does Van Eck want us to do for him that'd be worth thirty million kruge?”

Perhaps that’s the first question anyone should have asked.

“Go to Fjerda, break into the Ice Court, liberate the chemist who created Jurda Parem, and bring him back here,” Kaz enumerated in a flat tone.

Jesper bursted out laughing. “The Ice Court? The fjerdan stronghold? You’re kidding me!” He paused, letting himself fall onto a nearby chair, waiting for a confirmation that this was indeed an elaborate prank, but Kaz's face displayed the same cold seriousness.

“Do I look like I'm joking?”

“It’s the most secure prison in the world!” Jesper protested. “Compared to that, Hellgate is an alehouse!”

Kaz tapped the tip of his cane on the floor ; three dull thuds, like a stagehand before the apparition of a new Komedie character before the audience. “Speaking of Hellgate, if we want to get that job done, we need someone who knows the ins and outs of the Ice Court; someone who spent years living there.”

“You mean to free Matthias from Hellgate?” Nina managed, torn between hope, surprise, and dread. “I'm all for it, but even if we manage that, he'll never accept to help you.”

He dismissed her concern with a wave of his hand. “That's for me to worry about.”

A short silence fell on the room as all swallowed and weighed the new information and opportunity Kaz had offered. The only thing disturbing the quietness of the barroom was the thumping of Jesper’s sole on the floor from his leg bouncing restlessly as he bit on a hang nail on his thumb. He was the first to break the silence.

“I’m not insensible to the call of thirty million kruge, believe me,” Jesper said, “but this is an insane amount of money: how can we make sure Van Eck holds his end of the bargain?”

A devious, cat-like grin bloomed like a poisonous flower on Kaz's face. “Oh, because I have an ace up my sleeve,” he replied. He extended a hand toward Wylan with a theatrical flourish. Wylan was a reluctant actor in a play he wanted no part in, and the pantomime had reached its last act : the unmasking of the Grey Imp. “Everyone: meet Jan Van Eck’s son and our insurance on thirty million kruge.”

This time, the silence that followed was deafening. Jesper’s leg had stilled. Wylan’s body went rigid, eyes wide and blinking like a fox cornered by a pack of hounds.

Kaz knew. Of course he did. It had been foolish, maybe even stupid of Wylan to even try and convince himself otherwise. Him being Jan's son was the only reason why he had been recruited as the Crows’ demo man; not for his so-called talent or his quick thinking. The realization shouldn't have hurt ; this was Kaz Brekker, afterall. It did hurt anyway.

And yet, the shock Wylan felt was nothing compared to what he could see in his boyfriend’s dumbfounded stare. He could almost hear the gears turning in Jesper’s mind, and the puzzle pieces clicking into place, revealing an ugly picture. Even though he would have preferred looking anywhere else than towards Jesper at this very moment, he couldn't look away either.

“Wylan?” Jesper asked, as he rose from the chair slowly, voice still measured but with a sharp edge to it. The air between them was so thick and fraught with tension that even Inej’s knives would fail to cut through it.

“Jes… listen–” Wylan tried to explain, although he wasn't sure where to begin. The lies and secrets went pretty far back; all the way to the first night they met.

“That’s– That’s not true,” Jesper stuttered, clinging to his own denial. “That can't be true. Your last name is Hendriks…” The fact he still wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt broke Wylan’s heart in a thousand pieces.

“Hendriks is my mother’s maiden name. Van Eck is my father’s.”

“It can't be…”

“It is, Jesper,” Kaz intervened, firm and definitive. Wylan wished Kaz would have stayed out of it, but he was, in fact, right in the middle of it ; had been from the very start.

Jesper dragged a hand over his face, like someone waking up from a particularly dreadful nightmare. “How…Wh- … since when?”

Wylan had a rueful chuckle. “Since my birth, pretty much.” But perhaps, this wasn't the true meaning of Jesper’s question.

He knew from having run tests with various combinations of chemicals that some reactions took time to manifest. It didn't mean, however, that the explosion would be any less violent. And as Wylan watched, in real time, the residual warmth and disbelief drain from Jesper’s eyes, making way for something far darker, he realized he had been playing with fire and gunpowder, and was about to get burned.

He couldn’t anticipate the next words that came out of Jesper’s mouth, however.
“You're a mole.”

“What?”

“You’re a spy,” Jesper hissed, his temper getting frayed. “You’ve infiltrated the Crows for your father! That’s what this is, isn't it? You’re incredibly clever; of course you could pull that off! Saints!! Why didn't I see it before!? I’ve been such a fucking moron!”

“I'm not a mole,” Wylan said weakly. It was the truth, and yet, it sounded unconvincing.

Jesper ignored him. He had his glare on Kaz now, and he took a few threatening steps towards him. “You knew! You've known all along, Kaz!” he accused him. “From the very beginning; you knew who he was!”

Kaz’s face betrayed as much emotion as those of the marble statues in the hall of the Exchange. “I did.”

“What about Inej? She knew too, didn't she!? Was I the only one not to know!?” Jesper turned toward Nina. “Did you know as well?”

Nina shook her head. “Not really, apart from the things I could pick up from his heart rate, that is. I figured he was lying about certain things, but I assumed he had his reasons.” She glanced at Wylan, as if in apology, but nothing could soothe him right now. Everything felt bad and wrong.

Jesper’s anger was still directed toward Kaz, for now at least. “Why didn't you tell me anything!? Why didn't Inej !?” There was a good measure of hurt in his fury. He pointed a finger at Wylan next, his glare still aimed at Kaz “You let me sleep with the guy, Kaz!”

Wylan’s heart constricted. Once again, he was a regret in someone’s life ; a blemish, a stain, an indelible ink spot.

Kaz’s facade cracked, but only long enough for him to scoff and roll his eyes. “As if I could have prevented you…” He seemed to think about the whole situation as nothing more than a minor inconvenience.

“Were you sent to seduce me or something!?” Jesper asked Wylan with seething ire between every syllable. “Was everything between us just a ploy to keep an eye on Kaz and the Crows for your father!?”

“No, of course not!” Wylan tried to defend himself. “I've not seen my father in months!”

“He’s telling the truth,” Nina commented, her arms crossed over her chest. “He was lying earlier, about his datura meloxia hallucination, but now he’s telling the truth.”

Jesper bored his eyes into Wylan's, anger soaring to new heights. “Oh, now you're telling the truth! How convenient!!”

“Jesper, you don't understand!” The words had blurted out of Wylan in despair, and there were indeed great many things Jesper didn't understand regarding Wylan’s past, but showing him the extent of his ignorance was perhaps not the best strategy to adopt in the circumstances.

“Then, tell me!” Jesper fulminated, throwing his hands in the air, his volume increasing steadily. “Tell me, then! Or maybe, you're going to run away again, like you always do!! Or better yet, shut me up with a kiss ; distract me with sex!!!”

Jawline tense, Wylan shook his head, tears welling up. “I've not –” The sound died on his tongue.

“I think it’s our cue to leave, Kaz,” Nina declared. The fight was becoming too personal for comfort.

“Try not to kill each other,” Kaz advised, “or break the new furniture.” He followed Nina toward the staircase, and the two of them disappeared upstairs.

Jesper started pacing back and forth between the front door and the Makker's Wheel, his shoulders rising and falling with rapid, furious huffs. He ran his hands in his hair, pulling at handfuls of it. He was no doubt replaying his whole relationship with Wylan, from start to end, and rereading everything under the new, grim light of the uncovered truth. “The night we met; you refused to take your mask off… you were hiding your real identity, weren't you? That’s why you didn't want me to see your face!”

Wylan was frozen into place, eyes gleaming with unshed tears. “I wasn't hiding it from you specifically! I was hiding from everyone!”

“What am I supposed to think!? I don't know what to think anymore, Wylan!” Jesper yelled. His long, lithe frame stiffened as a new wave of doubt hit him. “I'm not even sure that's your real name, actually!”

“It's my name! I swear!”

That reassurance didn't seem to have a great deal of effect, because Jesper had resumed his fretful pacing. “The stuff you said about your mom being dead ; was that all to appeal to me!? To pretend you could relate to me?! To get my compassion?!”

“No!”

“And the fact you can't read ; were you just faking it so you could disguise yourself as an underprivileged Barrel kid!?”

This was a low, vicious blow. Wylan got the air knocked out of him. “Everything is real, I promise,” he managed in a labored whisper.

“Everything except who you are! That wasn't real, was it!?” Jesper accused him, nostrils flaring. “You gave me shit for not speaking about my durast powers! You had the audacity to lecture me while you were hiding this very major thing about yourself! You heard me speak of the way Van Eck ruined the lives of so many kaelish people in Ketterdam, and you said nothing! You had so many opportunities to come clean and tell me the truth and you lied, time and time again! Last night, when I said Kaz had called you a merchling ; you lied to my face, while I was on top of you, for Ghezen’s sake! And now you expect me to believe you didn't have any ill intentions!? How am I supposed to believe you!? How am I supposed to believe anything you say from now on!?” Jesper took a few steps in Wylan’s direction, and from up close, the depth of his anguish was plain to see. “I thought we agreed on being honest and open with each other!” Jesper reminded him, “but you don't trust me enough to do that, do you!? You're just like the others: like Kaz, and Inej, or even Nina, who thinks you’re an angel and so much better than me! Nobody trusts chaotic, dimwitted, impulsive Jesper! Nobody gives a fuck if I'm always the only one left in the dark!”

Wylan did his best to contain the tears that threatened to spill and betray his own weakness and guilt “Jes, please!”

“Don't…call me that,” Jesper snapped, straightening to his full height. “My friends call me Jes, and right now, I’m not sure what you are anymore.” A flash of deep, searing hurt veiled his face for a split second, before he turned his head, perhaps to hide it, and he stomped to the front door. As he was unlocking it, Wylan willed his legs into movement. He caught Jesper by the sleeve just as he was about to slip out across the threshold.

“Please, don't go!” Wylan begged him. “We said we would speak to one another; get through the difficult conversations together!”

Jesper's eyes were still hard, and his voice came out as cold as the early morning wind sweeping the leaves on Barkenstraat. “You haven't exactly held your end of that bargain so far, have you, Van Eck?” He had said the name with contempt, and a hint of disgust. He pulled his sleeve out of Wylan's grip in a brisk movement. “I don't see why I should bother.” He slammed the front door and he was gone.

Wylan went back upstairs, he curled up onto Jesper's bed and waited.

Somehow, he didn't cry. He was being emptied from his vital substance in other ways; soul hollowed out, and soon, there would be no more than an empty husk left where Wylan Hendriks Van Eck had once been. The mantle clock chimed seven bells, then eight, nine and ten. Wylan did not move. He was staring blankly at a spider building its web under the windowsill.

At noon, Nina knocked on the door, offering Wylan tea and the leftover ginger biscuits. He didn't answer. The spider had moved up the curtains, waiting for an unfortunate insect to get captured in its vile creation.

The sun set early, as those days were the shortest of the year. Night fell without a sound and Jesper had not come back, but he would. He would come back. And they'd talk it through.

Seven bells stretched into eight, then nine. At ten, Wylan's stomach and bladder were killing him, forcing him into motion. He ignored the former and only left the bedroom to relieve the latter. His tongue had the texture of sandpaper, so he cupped water from the bathtub faucet with both hands and drank until he was dizzy. Sounds of music, laughter and the clicking of the Makker's wheel came from downstairs, but he was mostly deaf to them, treading the hallway like a passing ghost.

When he reached the bed again, he lit a candle on one of the chandeliers affixed to the wall, so Jesper would not stumble in the dark if he came back in the wee hours. Wylan didn't bother undressing and curled up in the same exact spot he had left minutes earlier.

The spider had retreated to a dark corner of the window and he didn't see it again.

A little after midnight, Wylan reached for the nightstand and closed his fist around the key Jesper had made for him. He brought it to his chest and held onto it until the shape of it became imprinted in his palm. Jesper had fabrikated this key for him – had asked him to move in with him, and wanted to be his boyfriend. He wouldn't just leave and never come back again. He would not abandon Wylan completely, irrevocably.

At one bell, doubt crept like a snake down the pit of Wylan's guilt. He had betrayed Jesper; lost his trust, perhaps forever. There was a real chance that even if he came back, he would not want anything to do with Wylan ever again. Maybe, he would only come back to the Slat once Wylan would have gotten the message and vacated the premise.

At two bells, Wylan allowed himself to cry into the pillow.

Around three, he fell asleep, face pressed in the wet stain, the key still in his hand.

He had omitted to close the curtains, hadn't turned the gas heating on, or lit a fire in the hearth. As a result, he woke up shivering when the first daylight crept onto his face through the window. He rubbed the crusty corner of his eyes as the veil of sleep lifted from his brain and the memories of the previous day came flooding back.

Under the windowsill, a small, pale moth was thrashing in the spider’s trap, its soft wings entangled and damaged beyond hope or repair. At the edge of the web, the silent killer was watching and waiting for the prey to give up, long legs tucked underneath its black belly.

Wylan still had a hard time untangling the wires of his own situation. What was the link between the job his father had entrusted to the Crows, which had to do with a dangerous Grisha drug, and his quest to get rid of his son once and for all? The two had to be connected somehow. It couldn't just be a coincidence. What was Jan Van Eck waiting for, then? He could come and collect Wylan, or send the Stadwatch to the Slat to do the dirty work in his place. Maybe Kaz and Jan had an arrangement. Or, perhaps, his father hoped a suicide mission at the Fjerdan Ice Court would be enough to do the trick. He wouldn't even have to lift a finger or spend a single kruge in bribes to make his heir disappear. All of those scenarios were plausible. And yet, Wylan wasn't as preoccupied with himself as he was with Jesper: where he was, what he was doing, if he was still angry and hurt.

There was a noise at the door and Wylan rolled over, heart thumping in expectation.

The doorknob turned and Nina appeared in the doorframe, an apology ready on her lips : “I'm sorry. It's just me.”

She carried a tray into the bedroom containing a glass of fruit juice and a stack of waffles on a plate. She set it down on the nightstand. Wylan's utterly empty stomach churned at the sight and smell of food, but he refused to move.

Carefully, she sat on the edge of the bed. Her grey eyes were compassionate and gentle, but Wylan, like a petulant child, rolled onto his opposite side, grasping at the pillow and hugging it to his chest.

Nina was especially well placed to understand him; perhaps more than anyone else. She had resorted to lies and deception to save Matthias. He was in prison now because of the split decision she made, and she had to carry that burden of guilt. Except, Wylan hadn't lied to save Jesper ; he had lied to save himself.

She placed a hand upon his shoulder. “Kaz found him late last night. He was at the Sweet Shop.”

Wylan didn't have to ask who “him” was. She was speaking of Jesper. Wylan's heart jolted. Jesper had spent the night at the Sweet Shop; a pleasure house specializing in the trade of male prostitutes. Was he that petty as to go and purchase skin as soon as he left Wylan behind?

“Jesper says he doesn't want to come back,” Nina went on, her voice dim and quiet. “Kaz tried to convince him, but to no avail.”

“I understand,” Wylan croaked. His voice had gone raspy from tears and unuse. In a way, he was grateful Nina hadn't tried to sugar-coat it, cajole him into a false sense of hope, or try to persuade him that Jesper was going to change his mind, come around and forgive him once dust would have settled. Wylan was in so much pain, but, at least, now he knew where Jesper was standing, and he knew what needed to be done.

Nina gave his shoulder an ultimate squeeze before she rose from the bed. “Try to eat something, Wylan.”

“Thanks, Nina,” he whispered, and he meant it, although he had no intention of touching the food.

“You're welcome,” she said, and the door of the bedroom clicked closed as she left.

***

“Funny how history repeats itself,” Wylan told himself in grim realization. Here he was again, hungry, shaky, desperate, on the doorstep of Club Cumulus. The cloud-shaped sign had not lost a single chip of its gaudy blue paint in his absence. Yet, it felt as if a lifetime had come to pass since he came here on a rainy day not unlike this one, begging for a job.

He was a bit of a different person now; because of the Crows and the friendship Nina and Inej had shown him, and because of Jesper's care. He was walking with his shoulders pushed an inch back, and his steps a fraction more assured and purposeful, but his stomach was empty, albeit for a different reason, and fear was still rattling his bones. How much had really changed in the end?

Instead of going through the front door of the club, he went down the rainy sidewalk and took the alleyway leading to the side of the building. There, he climbed the precarious wooden stairwell, knowing not to try and rely on the handrails. He stopped on the landing at the top, in front of a lavender-colored door. Despite the state of the stairs, the front of the apartment was well-kept, with clean shutters and aster flowers still blooming in the window boxes despite the cold temperature. He took a deep breath and knocked on the door.

A few seconds passed before the door opened on a brawny, bald man.

“Hi Jeroen,” Wylan said, sheepish, but also relieved to find the barman home.

“Hendriks!?” Jeroen said in disbelief, surprised to see his former work colleague on his doorstep.

Wylan removed the wet, woolen beanie hat he had stolen from the last occupant of Jesper's room, and he ran a hand through his hair. “It's Wylan, actually. My real name is Wylan,” he confessed. No more lies.

Jeroen was frowning, but he took the revelation in his stride. “Okay… what can we do for you, Wylan?” The aforementioned “we” encompassed Jeroen's wife Lieke, who had appeared at her husband's side, wiping her flour-coated hands on her apron.

“We can't leave him like that in the rain!” Lieke exclaimed. “You should come in, dear,” she invited Wylan. “I’ve just taken a batch of bread rolls out of the oven and Jeroen will make us some black tea. Will you, darling?”

“Yes, of course,” Jeroen agreed, stepping aside and gesturing for Wylan to cross the threshold.

The kitchen was small but cozy, and Wylan sat in silence at the table while Jeroen prepared the tea and Lieke cut the warm bread rolls, spreading a generous layer of golden butter and strawberry jam onto them.

“So? What’s this about, Wylan,” Jeroen asked, sitting across from him with trepidation and no small amount of curiosity.

“I know I've no right to ask you anything, given how I left without a word the last time,” Wylan told him, “but I need you to do me a favor.” He pulled a hefty stack of kruge notes from his satchel and placed it in the middle of the table, between the bread rolls and the teapot.

Chapter Text

“Fuck! Shit!! Fucking shit!!” Jesper cursed, kicking the base of the lamp post. He had nearly collided with the damn thing as he stormed out of the Crow Club. It sent peeling paint chips and dust particles flying around his boot. Taking his anger out on hard metal turned out to be a poor idea. Pain reverberated through his toes, up his feet to his ankle. He let out another long string of curses, this time in Zemeni.

At the sight of that tall, gangster-looking guy in obvious fury, with two menacing revolvers at his hips, a man smoking on the sidewalk hastened to empty his pipe on the pavement, and to scurry back inside the nearest building.

Jesper continued down the street with long, hurried strides, limping slightly from his bruised toes. He took a turn right, then turned left, then right again. He wasn't sure where he was going. It didn't matter. He had to move. Go. Somewhere. Anywhere. Just away from here. Away from the Slat. Away from everyone. Away from himself, even. Of course that wasn't possible, but he’d try anyway.

Memories of the earlier argument welled up in him like successive bouts of nausea, leaving his mind retching with the urge to vomit it all out. He couldn't think because there were too many thoughts clawing at the inside of his skull, howling, and shrieking. His whole body itched so badly. He couldn't scratch because it wasn't on the surface ; it dwelt much deeper.

He walked on and on, eventually finding himself in the eastern part of the Lid, near the Zelver district. At a loss for any other way to quell the boiling distress inside him, he paced in tight circles around the same block. It was only after a while that a thought vaguely occurred to him: his behavior might seem suspicious, and someone could alert the Stadwatch. If he were still in the Barrel, where strange activities were a common sight and people were wary of the watch, the chances would have been slim. But here, it was a different story altogether.

Jesper headed along the West Stave in a somewhat straight line, and then South for countless minutes, until he forced himself to a halt.

He was out of breath, his legs ached and burned, and yet every square inch of him screamed to keep going. He had stopped under a lampost, not dissimilar to the one he had kicked earlier, although this one was freshly painted. It's only then that Jesper shivered for the first time. He had gone out without a coat or a hat, in the freezing wind and drizzle.

He cursed his damp hair, his flimsy shirt soaked in sweat, and the tweed waistcoat that couldn't do much against the shivers. Above his head, signs on the lamppost indicated he was standing on the corner of Koekjestraat and Dekselstraat.

Dekselstraat.

His wanderings had brought him a stone’s throw from Club Cumulus, of all places.

Further up the street, through the droplets clinging on his eyelashes, he could distinguish the dark blue door of the club and the cloud-shaped sign hanging above the entrance. Jesper blinked the rainwater away. He had a habit of forgetting details of conversations as soon as they happened, but he could now recollect with stabbing accuracy the exchange between him and Wylan, as they had strolled out of the club and up this very street on the first night they spent together. It was about two months ago by that point, and yet, it remained incredibly vivid.

“You talk fancy," Jesper had said, observing, out of the corner of his eye, the young man holding his arm. He had noticed right away that Wylan didn't speak with the characteristic drawl one might expect from a Barrel kid. Instead, he had a rich vocabulary, with sharp vowels and clipping consonants. "You don’t really sound like you belong in the Barrel or even the Lid," Jesper had pointed out, nudging him with a teasing elbow. "With that Grey Imp mask, for all I know, you could be a rich prince in disguise."

"If that was the case, I wouldn’t be working the worst shift in a gambling den, would I?" Wylan had replied, somewhat stiff and defensive, and now Jesper knew why.

This had been the first in a long string of lies, because for all intent and purpose, Wylan was Ketterdam royalty. Jesper hated the fact that this knowledge had now seeped into his brain, like sewer water in a basement, making the foundations rot away. Realizing this made him wonder what else had been false. What else had Wylan lied about? Was there more? Had everything else been a lie too? It tore him in half, just to entertain that possibility. That's why he didn't want to think about it.

It made more sense now, however, why Wylan had hid behind a mask, and fled the morning after their first encounter. He couldn't have taken a chance for Jesper to see him in the light of day, in case he had even a remote idea what the Van Eck heir looked like. And yet, weeks later, Jesper had walked into Wylan’s workshop, seen his face without a mask : his milky skin, his big, automnal eyes, his delicate hands and fine-boned throat, and for a split second, he had looked exactly like a prince who belonged in a different story : one taking place in an enchanted forest and not in the heart of the red-light district.

It had taken several days after that for Jesper to connect the dots, and realize Wylan was the young croupier he had picked up from the Cumulus. Wylan, on the other hand, had said nothing, until Jesper finally put two and two together. Now, he couldn't help but wonder how long Wylan would have kept up the pretense, had Jesper not recognized him in the end.

What on earth was a mercher's son doing in this part of town, slaving away in a tannery, working at the table of a gambling hall, or playing the pauper in a dingy workshop down Rozenstraat? Why choose to live like this, when you have a life of fortune and fineries waiting for you elsewhere? Why agree to this of your own volition if you don't have shady intent?

Jesper felt the telltale tension of an upcoming headache crushing his temples like a vice.

His mind just wasn't able to reconcile the reality of Wylan Hendriks with the one of Wyan Van Eck. Just that name; Wylan… Van Eck: it was like two disjoint pieces of metal that did not fit together, no matter the skills of the durast who’d try to assemble them. Jesper attempted to envision Wylan wearing a pressed black suit and a stiff starched collar, posing for a portrait in a gigantic drawing parlor, drinking port wine in a tiny crystal glass, and arranging fresh flowers, or whatever nonsense posh people did. It didn't work. It didn't match. Wylan Van Eck wasn't his Wylan—the one he had traveled with, laughed with, and shared meals with while sitting on rickety stools or on a ship deck; the one he had made love to and kept warm in his arms; the one who had faced danger beside him and saved his life. And yet, they were the same person. In that instant, however, he couldn't help but resent Wylan Van Eck for having taken his boyfriend away.

In any case, the hotblooded, righteous ire that made one flush and reddened: Jesper couldn't count on it to keep him warm anymore. Instead, what remained was the kind of anger that stabbed you in the back, left your face pale and your eyes teary; the sort that hid something else underneath, something deeper, even nastier, and more painful. He had no desire to open that lid and look to see what was underneath. He had no intention to face the root of his anguish. Instead, he'd bury the damn thing as deep as he could, and for as long as possible. The consequences would come for him, inevitably, but he hoped they'd find him blissfully drunk and sitting on an immense pile of kruge. Speaking of which, he still had the check from the last job's payment burning the seams of his pocket and a jagged hole in his chest that needed filling.

Jesper had gotten so good at numbing any inner discomfort, ever since he dropped out of university and found himself roaming the streets of Ketterdam; so good at distracting himself, at silencing the restlessness. Now, that skill was going to pay off.

***

The bank teller, a young woman with curly hair and large spectacles, stared at Jesper with eyes about as wide as the brims of her glasses. “You want to withdraw 100 000 kruge all at once?” she asked for a third time, her gaze flickering between the check on the counter and the lanky individual standing before her. “Are you quite sure, Mr Fahey?”

“I told you; I'm not interested in opening a bank account,” Jesper retorted. “I want all of those in paper bills.”

She raised one manicured eyebrow. “That makes for a lot of paper bills, Mr Fahey.”

The way she kept saying his last name, as if this would put more weight to her words and make him change his mind was beginning to get on his nerves, and he wasn't at his most patient. He leaned against the front of the counter, hoping to give himself an appearance of calm. The sooner he got his hand on the money, the sooner he’d be spending it. “You can give me bills of a thousand kruge, mam. I don't mind.”

She hesitated, her fingernails drumming on the sturdy oak desk. The Ketterdam International Bank had all the markings of an ancient, reputable establishment; with its white basalt columns, its practical hardwood furniture, and its high marble staircases framed in intricate wrought iron railings. The marble was real, Jesper had noticed as he had reached the front door earlier ; unlike what could be found in places such as the Blue Paradise, where the luxury was nothing more than a theater decor. This place here, however, had been built on fortunes like the Lantsovs’ …. or the Van Ecks’. Jesper, with his Barrel flash and his hair damp with rain, looked like a stray dog in the middle of a ballroom. He got many funny looks from customers and employees alike, and a frankly alarmed one from the bank teller when he had walked up to the counter. Entering a bank with charged revolvers hanging from his belt might not have been the wisest. He managed to somewhat calm her apprehension with his most charming smile and honeyed baritone.

“We don't issue those often, Mr Fahey,” the bank teller said after a moment. “Bills of a thousand are not commonly in circulation.”

Granted, most of the ones Jesper had seen were fake. He still insisted. “Does that mean you don't have any here?”

“We do… it's just…”

“It's just what?”

Her lips thinned in polite discomfort. “Most people wouldn't think it wise to carry that much money on themselves.”

He slid a finger over the handle of his right revolver. “That's very nice of you to fear for my safety,” he told her. “But I will be fine, don't worry.”

She heaved a long sigh. “Very well, Mr Fahey.” She picked up the check from the counter and disappeared behind revolving doors that no doubt hid the way to the vault.

Ten minutes later, Jesper stepped out of the bank, slipping two stacks of bills inside his coat pockets and he set out toward the Geldin District.

Left to his own devices again, the sour, bitter taste of betrayal and hurt threatened to rise up once more. He managed to swallow it down, to keep it in the background; maintain it as a blur of uneasiness, instead of letting it conjure any precise image. If he let it take a hold of his brain, he would see Wylan again : the panic on his face and the shame of being discovered… he would see Kaz's cold, callous, uncaring expression, or Nina's apologetic one. No. He would not revisit any of it. Not now. Later, perhaps, he'd have the courage to go back to the Slat, face Kaz, and speak to Wylan in a civilized way. Now, he was cold, and he needed clothes.

Once he had crossed the bridge over the Geldcanal, he asked directions to an old couple walking hand in hand underneath a violet umbrella. They told him how to get to the Fijnedraad : the luxury tailor he only knew from reputation. Jesper frequented a couple high-end hat makers by the canal, but he just never had the kind of money one needed to even step foot at the Fijnedraad.

At first, the store clerk almost threw him out, until Jesper flashed him a stack of money, and the man suddenly became a lot more amiable; calling Jesper “sir” and showing him around the shop with great consideration. One of the first feelings Jesper had, walking around the shop, was one of disappointment. It displayed well-made suits of the best quality, but in a blatant lack of interesting colors. He should have expected it. Wealthy merchers came here to have their clothes made, and they weren't known for their vibrant tastes.

“You don't have anything that wouldn't make me look like I'm going to a funeral?” Jesper inquired.

The clerk blinked slowly, nodded, then brought Jesper to a small section at the very back, to a rack with clothes that would probably be considered highly eccentric in this part of town. “Now we're speaking,” Jesper muttered under his breath as he gazed upon lavish velvet with silk lining, brushed lambswool of the highest grade, all of those in rich colors obtained from rare, exotic dyes. He ran his fingers on the fabrics, focusing on the texture : anything to keep his thoughts occupied. The suits, with matching neckties, scarves or pocket squares, were 4000 kruge each: about half of what a club croupier would earn in a year of work. Jesper took three and had them adjusted immediately. He also purchased three exquisite top hats of the finest beaver felt. The material shined like the flank of one of those racehorses that were so black they appeared almost blue.

He put on one of his new suits: the red, velvet one, added a long dark blue wool coat over it and adjusted one of his new top hats at the right angle, in front of the store's mirror. Then, he stepped outside in the drizzle, with his bags slung over his shoulder.

He took three steps, then stopped. First of all, he had no clear plan where to go next. Second of all, even if he would've wanted to go back to the Slat, which he truly wasn't sure was a good idea, now he didn't have that option anymore. He couldn't go back there carrying three bags of new, luxury clothes; he'd look like the man who had caused a scene, only to go on a shopping spree as soon as he had slammed the door. Wylan had torn a bullet hole through Jesper's chest, that was true. But, there was also a distinct possibility that Jesper had done the same to Wylan. They'd have to look at one another; gape at the wounds mutually inflicted, and Jesper would feel even more awful for doing it in fancy new clothes. He'd look like someone who just didn't care.

He couldn't go back to the Slat. Not so soon. Not like this. Kaz would look at Jesper, seeing him as the chaotic mess he was. He couldn't bear that. He needed not to be reminded.

So, instead, Jesper went to the Geldrenner Hotel and rented the Ketterdam suite: throwing a handful of bills on it just because he could. If he was to be miserable and start hating himself, which he would end up doing anyways, he might as well do it in the best room the city had to offer.

The suite took up the entire top floor of the hotel, and was lavishly decorated in the city's heraldic colors : dark purple and silver. The purple was reflected everywhere, from the carpet to the wallpaper adorned with a school of silver fish pursuing one another in a swirling pattern.

The bathroom had a shower-bath, a rare luxury in Ketterdam. Jesper took a long, scalding hot shower, trying to chase the chill that had settled in his bone marrow, but it didn't manage to make him feel any less cold.

He ordered the three most expensive dishes on the room service menu : lobster caviar, roasted pheasant and filet mignon with mint sauce. He ate quickly, without even paying attention to the taste.

Next, he ordered two bottles of top-shelf whisky, and he drank a third of the first bottle, wrapped in a bathrobe, staring blankly at the silver fish shapes carved into the ceiling of the master bedroom. He had never been in such a lavish place, and one that felt so empty. In fact, it was gnawing at him with more intensity with each passing minute, and sips upon sips of whisky couldn't make it go away. That boundless, nervous boredom : he knew it too well. It was an uninvited old acquaintance that would have better been left outside. But it was on his threshold now, waiting for him.

He knew only one good way to make it go away.

The call of the dice: it crawled under his skin like a collection of white beetles with black dots on their back. Once, at the Emerald Palace, Jesper had rolled sixes four times in a row, and his blood had come alive in his veins.

Night had fallen when Jesper stepped outside the Geldrenner. The street pavement was wet with the drizzle, shimmering in the gas lamplight. Against the dark sky, the statue of Ghezen's hand on top of the Church of Barter seemed to be flipping him off. Jesper was pretty tipsy, verging dangerously on drunkenness, and even if walking under the rain would probably help him sober up, he still shivered at the unpleasant prospect. “I can rent a bloody carriage,” he realized out loud, and went back into the hotel to arrange it with the concierge.

The carriage ride down to Fifth Harbour took nearly one full bell, since, despite the weather, the streets were busy with pleasure-seekers. The coachman almost had a heart attack when Jesper handed him a hundred kruge bill as a tip. The man called after him, probably thinking this was a mistake, but Jesper was already heading down towards the docks.

When he got by the waterfront, Jesper didn't smile or rejoice outwardly, but he felt an unmistakable jolt of excitement when he spotted the silhouette of a large barge decorated with strings of red tinted glass lanterns.

There it was : the Lucky Nine Casino.

“Casino” was perhaps a generous term to speak about a gambling house set onboard a converted coal-carrier, but that den of vice was still a well-known curiosity for tourists and a draw for local gamblers. Finding the Lucky Nine always felt like a strike of luck in itself, since it moved from harbor to harbor, up and down the Staves and the canals. Jesper had taken a shot in the dark by coming to 5th Harbor in the hope it was moored there. It seemed luck was already on his side tonight.

Jesper walked down the ramp from the dock onto the ship. The bouncer guarding the door had a tattoo on the side of his neck ; a hand missing the fore and middle finger. He nodded at Jesper with a look of recognition and he let him in without a word. The place was controlled by the Blacktips, and while they knew Jesper was from a rival gang, they liked his money more than they resented his allegiance to the Crows.

Inside the hull of the ship, candlelight from chandeliers flickered along the curved walls. At the center of the room, a large mahogany Makker's wheel spun smoothly, its polished surface reflecting the light. Men and women of all stations—some with glittering jewels, others with desperate eyes— were gathered around the various gaming tables. The clinking of coins, and the rustle of banknotes and cards, blended with the occasional cheer of victory or groan of defeat that punctuate the otherwise hushed murmurs.

The scent of brandy mingled in the air with that distinctive human smell : the sweat of adrenaline, risk and uncertainty, made sweeter by the hope of a potential reward and the rush of a winning streak. Jesper wanted to bathe in it. The steady lurch of the ocean waves and its rolling rhythm seemed to add to the pulse of the games, or, maybe, Jesper still had too much whisky in his blood.

He took an available seat at a blackjack table. The croupier gave him a neutral smile, and the other players peeked at him with polite interest, until Jesper placed 2000 kruge on the table and all eyes widened. The croupier sought the floor manager, a heavyset man with a handlebar mustache, who shrugged in response. This was a high bet, but not enough to put the house’s edge at risk.
Jesper made 300 Kruge in his first three rounds. That got his blood flowing, and his leg bouncing under the table. He celebrated his gain with a glass of brandy. And when he started losing, he swallowed down the bitterness with more alcohol.

By the time he moved to the Makker's Wheel, he was considerably drunk, and threw 6000 kruge on the table. The croupier, a slender woman with a Shu accent, refused his bet and apologized. “I'm sorry. We're trying to keep the game fair.” A bet this large was a risk for the house, as it could lead to equally large losses.
Jesper huffed in frustration. “Fine,” he groaned, and removed four of the six paper bills on the table.
“Where did you get all that money anyways, Fahey?” asked the player standing at Jesper’s right.
Jesper turned to look at him, and the process took a moment longer than it usually would, his movements made sluggish by intoxication. The man who had addressed him was of average height, with coarse white hair and a large forehead. Jesper had a vague impression he knew who he was, but his head was spinning too much to remember. He thought the man might be called “Amen”, but it was an absurd name that did not make sense.

“The banishment of the Fold, surely you've heard of it. Well, the Crows had a hand in it, and the Lantsov paid us with a king’s ransom,” Jesper boasted. “But there's more to come. Now it's bloody Jan Van Eck who wants to rope us into the Council's international intrigues. He's been trying to get rid of the gangs and to clean the Barrel for decades, and now he's ready to dump millions of kruge for us to deal with the Council’s problems. Isn't that ironic?”

The coarse-haired player considered Jesper's words, but he gave a sly smile and said nothing.
Jesper ordered another glass of brandy and placed a new bet.

Around midnight, Jesper had made 400 kruge, and lost 2000. With so much money at hand, the loss and the gains felt insignificant. Boredom was coming back, and with it, the thoughts.

His friends had known about Wylan’s real identity, and they had kept it from him this entire time. Kaz being a secretive bastard, at least, that was predictable. It was the first time, however, that one of Kaz’s lies of omission had truly been at Jesper’s expanse, or, at least, hit so close and personal. And Inej? He really thought he could trust her, but, of course, if Kaz asked her to hide something from Jesper, she would. It left a sour taste in his mouth.

A group of well-dressed youngsters befriended Jesper at the poker table. “We should go to the Honey Pot – they accept much larger bets there,” one of them suggested. The Honey Pot was the illegal, underground gambling parlor in the basement of the Sweet Shop. Jesper had never gone there – because he never had the kind of money that granted one’s entry in this den of sin for the upper class. Tonight was different.

He followed the others to the Honey Pot, because he had to keep playing not to think ; of Domnhaill rotting in jail; not to think of Rory and the others in hiding; not to think of Kaz and Inej and their secrets; not to think of his father who thought Jesper was a respectable university student , but, more than anything, not to think of Wylan; not to think about anything else but the next hand of card, the next spin of the wheel, the next roll of dice, the next glass of spirit. Not.to.think.at.all.

The entrance to the Honey Pot was concealed in the alleyway behind the famed pleasure house and its candy-like, multicolor columns. The door was plain and unassuming, but still heavily guarded. A password had to be provided, but one of the young men accompanying Jesper knew it, and the bouncers granted entrance to their small group without any more questions.

The low ceiling room was clean, but pretty unassuming for a high stake gambling hall. Yet, it was spacious, with burgundy leather chairs at every table. The tables, he noticed, lacked the usual green lining synonymous with gambling: for plausible deniability, he supposed.

Flesh was on offer, and one of the rent-boys wandering between tables batted his lashes at Jesper. Those were long eyelashes, framing deep brown eyes that wanted to appear innocent, but had seen too much to be convincing. Jesper turned away, swallowing down thickly. He wasn't planning on having someone in his lap distracting him from the game; moreover, someone who could remind him of …

Here, the bets started in the tens of thousands, and the stakes, hence, high enough to keep Jesper on the edge of his seat ; gaze and mind absorbed by the draw and reveal of cards.

He even forgot to order more alcohol for at least two bells and the buzz of drunkenness started to loosen his grip on him. He soon remedied it by buying rounds for all the players at his table, making him a very popular man.

The good thing about illegal clubs was that they didn't have to close at 3am, and, at a quarter to four, Jesper was still at the blackjack table. He had just reaped the rewards of an especially juicy and risky bet when suddenly, the croupier, and the other players at his table fell silent, staring at something behind Jesper’s back.
Jesper sighed deeply and twisted around on his chair to throw a look over his shoulder.

He was unsurprised to find Kaz standing there, leaning on his cane. How he had managed to track Jesper down was anyone’s guess, however.

Kaz was thin-lipped, and to the untrained eye, his scowl was nothing out of the ordinary, but someone who knew him well could read the disapproval in it. Jesper wasn't interested at all in getting a lecture. He had dropped out of university for that very reason.

“Jesper,” Kaz said, voice firm and brisk.

Ignoring him, Jesper turned back around to assess his hand of cards. He wasn't a dog to be called to heels.

“It's time to come home,” Kaz insisted. And again, it sounded more like an order than a benevolent suggestion.

Jesper gritted his teeth. “Go to hell.”

“That's not very polite,” Kaz pointed out, his tone infuriatingly even.

“I'm folding,” Jesper declared, throwing his cards down to get out of the round. He stood from his chair and staggered through the four steps separating him from Kaz. He planted his feet right in front of him, his face inches away in a show of defiance. “You know what wasn't very polite?” Jesper snarled, quietly enough that only Kaz could hear. “Using me to get Wylan to come back to Kerch.”

Kaz didn't flinch, and he didn't confirm nor deny. Yet, Jesper knew he had aimed right. “You thought I wouldn't realize that was your goal?” he went on. “You really believe I'm a moron, don't you?”

“What I believe is that you're too drunk to think clearly,” Kaz stated, holding Jesper's glare.

“When I had this fight with Wylan before we left Ketterdam,” Jesper went on, unfazed, “Inej convinced him to come with us to Shu Han. I’m sure you were the one who asked her to do that.” Kaz's subsequent silence was all Jesper needed. “Of course you were! You wanted to keep your insurance close by for later use, didn't you?”

Once again Kaz remained stone-faced.

“People's feelings don't matter to you,” Jesper concluded, “Inej said it best: we’re just pawns. Well, I'm not willing to be your pawn tonight. So, just in case that wasn't clear enough already: go fuck yourself.”

“Very well,” Kaz replied, dusting imaginary lint from the lapel of his coat. Without a word more, he turned on his heels and walked toward the exit.

A violent nausea grabbed Jesper by the throat, and a few minutes later, he was vomiting his guts out in the back alley behind the Sweet Shop. A tabby cat was silently judging him from where it perched on an empty crate of brandy. In the dark, Jesper could swear its eyes were the same shade of icy blue as Kaz’s, and he swore to never touch brandy again.

***

Waking up turned out to be a brutal experience. Jesper cracked an eye open and was immediately assaulted by the bright morning light piercing through his vulnerable pupils. His head was pounding furiously. Why was he feeling so horrible? Had he caught the flu? He screwed his eyelids shut. It helped with the pain, but the spinning sensation only increased, and with it the nausea. At least he was in his bed.

“Wy?” he called out. His voice came out raspy and strained. His throat hurt and the taste in his mouth was nastier than anything he had ever tasted before, and he had been subjected to the fruits of Raske's experimental beer-making.

As he got no response, he forced his eyes open once again, taking in his surroundings.
His feeble consciousness first noticed the purple bedcover, then, the expanse of purple carpeting going across the floor all the way up to the window. He wasn't in his own bed at all. Outside, the geometrical outline of the Exchange, and the distinctive tower from the Church of Barter told him he was back in the Ketterdam Suite at the Geldrenner. Of course, there would be no Wylan here. The reality of it impaled him like a javelin.

Most of last night was a sickening blur. Now, he could remember the Lucky Nine and the Honey Pot, although the details remained hazy. He recalled vomiting in a back alley, then, nothing else.

His chest, his back and his neck were clammy. He had slept fully dressed, with his wool coat on, and, as a result, had sweated like a pig all through the night. His top hat was on the edge of the mattress, probably having rolled off his head when he collapsed on the bed in his drunken stupor. He tried to reach for it, but knocked it down to the floor instead.

“Fuck….”

If he was here now, that meant he had managed to make his way back from the Sweet Shop to the hotel somehow, although he couldn't for the life of him remember how. It was a miracle he hadn't been mugged and beaten to a pulp. Unless…

With a sinking feeling that had little to do with his hangover, he sat onto the bed with a panicked grunt, shoving his hands into every one of his coat pockets. The money was gone. Everything he had been carrying on him had been taken.

Blood turned cold in his veins. He was seized by an intuition that this situation might be even worse than he thought. He stood on unsteady legs and made his wobbly way to the living room.

The strongbox into which Jesper had locked the rest of his money lay opened as the lock had been forced. “Shit! No no no no no no!!!” Jesper lamented, ignoring the searing pain hammering the inside of his skull in order to cross the room and witness the desolation of that empty box from up close.

It had all vanished; to the last penny.

The wind was knocked out of his lungs and he let himself slide down along the nearest wall to a sitting position. Trembling, he braced his knees with his arms, folding his long body into a tight ball.

One hundred thousand fucking kruge: gone in one single night.

How much he had lost at the Honey Pot ; he couldn't even recollect. Then, someone, or maybe several people, must have “helped” him come back here, and then, they decided to help themselves to his new fortune as he was lying unconscious on the bed, oblivious. It must have been as easy as taking candies from a baby.

It appeared the thieves hadn't touched his revolvers or his new clothes, only taking the money. That was a small, very small consolation.

Kaz was right. He was a moron. The worst moron the streets of Ketterdam had ever seen.

He couldn't return to the Slat with his tail between his legs. It would only prove to everyone how much of a failure he was; untrustworthy and undeserving. The humiliation was total. The weight of it kept him down on the floor for a full hour.

***

Jesper left the Geldrenner at noon, as he didn't have the means now to pay for another night. He had stuffed his new suits and hats inside a large cloth bag with the logo of the hotel on the side : the triangular tower that sat atop the Geldrenner.

The drizzle had stopped sometimes during the night, only to be replaced with actual rain. Heavy gusts of wind howled through the Lid's narrow streets, threatening to blow Jesper's top hat off his head as he crossed the district on foot. The discomfort of it was mild in comparison with the inner turmoil he carried with him down an alleyway to the back of the club.

The planks of the fence separating him from the courtyard were weathered but sturdy, their rough edges a contrast to the sleek stone walls beyond. His limbs were heavy, his stomach churning, and the fence loomed over him like a towering wall; an insurmountable obstacle.

He swung the cloth bag to the other side, not caring if it landed in mud, and he gripped the rough wood, muscles protesting as he pulled himself up, each motion slow and clumsy. Finally, with a grunt, he swung his leg over the top and stumbled onto the other side, barely managing to keep his balance. It wasn’t graceful, but he made it.

He retrieved his bag from the ground and went to the second door from the left, the light blue one, where he knocked, hoping there was someone in.

He heard the scraping of the deadbolt with a mix of trepidation and relief.

“Jes…” Poppy breathed when they opened the door, wrapping themselves tighter in their lime green shawl against the cold and damp, as they took in the sight of him standing out there.

“Hi Poppy,” he said, his voice had come out rougher, shakier and more pitiful than intended. He felt a wreck, and no doubt looked like one as well: a stark contrast to the fancy clothes he was wearing.

“What happened?” Poppy asked with a wince, in the hush tone of someone addressing a lost, distressed child.

The harsh tremor of a sob went through Jesper, and the floodgates opened.

“Come here,” Poppy said, opening their arms, stepping outside under the rain to drag him into their embrace. “Tulia, Jesper mpendwa. Nimekupata. Uko salama.”

Poppy's soft reassurance that Jesper was fine, safe and held, had little effect on him, as he shook, and cried, face buried in the crook of his friend’s neck. This felt more like vomiting tears than crying, actually. Grief was shredding his insides.

After several minutes of Poppy rubbing his back and keeping him close, the sobs receded, and he was able to step back, sniffling, and wiping his tears-stained face.

“Let’s go inside,” Poppy offered, gesturing toward the opened door. “Let’s sit down, and then, you can tell me all about it, or not, I’ll let you decide.”

Jesper nodded wordlessly and followed them into the private dressing room.

There was something mildly comforting about the familiarity of the space : its floor covered with a plush, patterned carpet that has seen years of use, the once-vibrant colors now slightly muted by time; or the costumes, with feathers and satin ribbons strewn across them, piled on the dressing table.

Two plush armchairs sat awkwardly in a corner of the room, their velvet cushions worn by constant use. Jesper crashed onto one of them.

“Do you want something to drink?” Poppy offered, walking up to the liquor cabinet and grabbed a bottle. “I've got brandy.”

He shook his head with vehemence, his stomach protesting at the mere mention. “No. Please, no. Never again. Do you have jurda stems, though?”

Poppy put the bottle down, eyebrow furrowed. “Hungover?” they surmised, studying Jesper's strained face.

“Quite. I think that's the worst I've ever had, actually.” Jesper massaged his temples in an effort to relieve the pressure around his skull. The tears had only made the headache worse.

“What did you have?”

“Whisky, a lot of brandy… and I think some sherry as well, and perhaps champagne, although I'm not sure anymore.”

“Saints, Jesper! That's lethal!” Poppy exclaimed. “What were you thinking?”

“I wasn't, actually. That was the whole point.” He paused for a moment. “I just…wanted to forget. I felt hurt, Pyp, and angry.” He wasn't sure if this was meant to justify his catastrophic bender, or if he just wanted to confide in someone who'd listen.

“Hm,” Poppy simply emitted, crossing the room to a large wardrobe which was so overflowing with gowns that opening it almost caused an avalanche of sequined fabric. They retrieved a cylindrical tin box from the wardrobe’s top shelf, which could only contain dried jurda. “Is this about Wylan?” Poppy inquired, as they went to the small gas stove and put the kettle on.

“Yes, but not only,” Jesper admitted. “And now, I've fucked up on so many levels! Honestly, I think I deserve that headache, so perhaps you should hold on to that jurda.”

“Nonsense,” Poppy refused with a wave of their hand. “Besides, once your head is clear, you’ll be able to do exactly what you've been putting off : thinking.”

Jesper groaned. “That’s awfully good of you.”

“My pleasure.”

When the water came to a boil, Poppy poured it in a teapot, over the jurda stems, then brought the tea tray to the low table between the armchairs. They sat down across from Jesper.

The first sip of tea tasted salty, from the remaining tears that had smeared over Jesper's lips. The subsequent ones were as they should : floral, spicy, if a little bitter. The headache wouldn't recede right away, however. Jurda was a lot more effective at preventing a hangover than curing it, but the heat of it still managed to steady Jesper somewhat.

He was able to recount his latest misadventures to Poppy, beginning with the reveal of Wylan's heritage, the argument that followed, and the impulsive string of decisions that had led him to Poppy’s door.

“And I suppose you were hoping to use that money to repay your father,” Poppy remarked.

Jesper put his cup down and rubbed the back of his neck. "Amongst other things," he muttered. The truth was, he hadn’t given his father much thought the night before. But when they were still in Ravka, and Kaz had announced how much Nikolai was going to pay them, Jesper had planned on sending part of it to his father in Novyi Zem. Or perhaps "planned" wasn’t the right word—Jesper had never been great at planning ahead. Still, the opportunity to right some wrongs had lingered in his mind. He would have had the means to pay back everything he owed his dad: all the money he’d gambled away over the years instead of using it for an education he’d long since abandoned. It would have been a start, a kind of atonement, because money couldn’t undo the lies. But now, that chance was gone, vanished in a puff of smoke—like a bad magic trick.

“Did you ever tell Wylan about this?” Poppy questioned, pouring themselves a cup of jurda as well, just for the warmth and taste. “About your father and the money you lost?”

Jesper gave a humorless chuckle. “Ghezen! No! I didn't want to fall that far down in his esteem!”

“Then, you can't really fault him for hiding certain things about his own family relations,” Poppy pointed out.

“But his father’s Jan Van Eck,” Jesper protested forcefully. “He’s the definition of an evil asshole!”

“Is Wylan, though?”

“No,”Jesper said in a huff, slumping back into the chair. The obvious goodness in Wylan was one of the key reasons why Jesper had fallen for him: and he didn't want to believe this had been nothing but an act all along. “But that’s not the point!” Jesper retorted.

“Is it? What tells you Wylan agrees with his father’s action or supports them anyways?”

The question made something unlatch from the dark depth of Jesper's memory and it bubbled up to the surface. It was something Wylan had told Kaz when they were in that mausoleum at Black Veil: “Alby Rollins can't help who his father is. You can't punish him for that."

Jesper himself had regarded Alby Rollins with contempt—just another rich, privileged brat, obnoxious and entitled, who had everything handed to him on a silver platter. He had assumed the kid would inevitably turn out as terrible as his father. But Wylan, of course, saw things differently. To him, Alby was a helpless child, blameless for the actions of the man who happened to be his father. Jesper now wondered, though the answer seemed obvious, how much of himself Wylan had seen in Alby. Perhaps Wylan had said nothing about his own parentage because he feared Jesper would judge him the same way—just like he had judged the young master Rollins. The thought made Jesper's heart sink. He wished Wylan had been honest with him, instead of keeping the truth hidden. It would have spared them both a lot of heartache.

“What made you think he even owed you the truth,” Poppy asked between two sips of infusion, observing Jesper over the brim of the cup, “or the whole story in a definite amount of time?”

Jesper rolled his wrist, stirring the tea in his cup and watching the vortex of orange liquid it created. “Maybe not ‘owed me’, but I would've wanted him to trust me enough to assume his real identity.”

“So you can feel like someone to be trusted, and feel better about yourself?”

“Yes,” Jesper acknowledged out loud, almost startling himself as he did. That’s exactly what he had wanted, in fact : getting Wylan’s complete openness and trust, to prove something to himself, to his friends, to everyone. That was quite selfish and self-serving, now that he thought about it. “Saints, Pyp!” he said with a mixture of regret and frustration, “You're certainly not making me feel any better about myself! “

“Wouldn't dream of it,” they replied lightly, crossing one long, stocking-clad leg over the other. “You’re here for my tough love.”

“I suppose,” Jesper mumbled, and he was back to staring at the bottom of his cup instead of drinking. “So, basically, you’re saying everything is my fault, and neither Wylan nor anyone else did anything wrong?”

“It’s not what I’m saying,” Poppy countered, pouring some more jurda tea into Jesper’s cup, and choosing a gentler, more compassionate approach. “In an ideal world, Wylan would've been honest and upfront with you. Learning that someone you care about has been lying to you about a major thing, it leaves you wondering how much of that person you truly know. That's bound to hurt.”

“Exactly,” Jesper breathed out. He had desired Wylan from the beginning, and rapidly developed a deep affection for him. He admired him for his talents, intelligence and skills, but he realized, with a sinking feeling, that had never truly understood him. There was just too much he didn't know about his past : about the things that made Wylan who he was. The blank areas took a lot more space than the ones with defined colors.

And right now, Jesper was so awfully exhausted, like his muscles were completely depleted of strength or tonus. The hollow in his chest was back, but he would rather ask Poppy to tie him up and lock him into a closet than hit the town to try and fill it. Besides, he had no money to his name to do so.

Poppy leaned forward and their hand came resting over Jesper’s knee, squeezing gently to catch his attention. “You look tired, Mpenzi. Finish your infusion and I’ll set up the camp bed in a corner,” they offered in a soothing voice. “You’re welcome to sleep here for the rest of the day, and to stay the night, if you want.”

Common courtesy would have probably instructed Jesper to protest, but he was too weary to do so, and instead, he accepted with whispered, grateful words of thanks.

Poppy set up the bed as promised, and Jesper fell asleep almost as soon as his head hit the pillow stuffed with buckwheat hulls, which kept his painful head pleasantly cool.

***

When Jesper woke again, the sky was dark outside the small, high window of the dressing room. He was alone. Poppy was performing their show on stage at this very moment, if the faint music and cheers that his ear caught in the distance were any indication.

He lay on the camp bed, flat on his back, one hand tucked behind his head. For a long while, he stared at the stucco ceiling, trying to make sense of the random patterns, just as he used to with clouds when he lay in the jurda field as a child—imagining shapes like wild animals from the savanna, fantastical monsters, garden tools, or buildings of eccentric architecture. The goal was to keep his thoughts from spinning out of control, but of course, it was never that simple. Before long, his mind drifted back to Wylan.

Poppy's earlier words had stayed with Jesper, and it made him look at the situation under a new light. It raised new questions as well.

On their first night together, Wylan had told him he lived in a squalor near the tannery, and Jesper hadn't thought less of him for being poor. Why did he think less of him for being born rich?
It still didn’t make much sense why Wylan would give up a privileged life to play demolition man for the Crows, but Jesper hadn’t exactly given him a chance to explain. He’d only hurled his hurt at Wylan, shutting down any space for him to justify himself. Perhaps part of the reason Jesper had reacted that way was because Wylan was so sweet, so kind—and he had been waiting for the other shoe to drop, for the moment everyone would realize Jesper wasn’t good enough for him. In the end, how much of it was self-sabotage? How much of it was self-inflicted punishment?

Jesper had lied to his father in the letters he sent from Ketterdam—about what he was truly doing here. And he hated himself for it. Every time he took a moment to reflect on his actions, he painted the picture of someone he didn’t like. Seeing that Wylan had lied too, about something important, made Jesper judge him just as harshly as he judged himself.

It was for this reason that being told—or worse, shown—that he was unreliable, untrustworthy, or irresponsible hurt Jesper the most. Those were the very things he told himself every day. So when he realized that, no matter how much he tried to earn Wylan’s trust, his lover had never trusted him enough to be fully honest, it felt like a stab through his very core. The fact that neither Kaz nor Inej had trusted him with that information only made it worse.

At eleven bells, Poppy came back with food : sausages and mince-veal bitterballen. Jesper was grateful, but ate without appetite.

Around midnight, when Poppy wished him goodnight and retreated to their studio apartment on the club building's third floor, the pain and emotional ache had spreaded like a disease from Jesper's muscles to his bones. Yet, he fell asleep again. It carried him through to the next morning. By then, his body had ridden out the aftereffects of intoxication, but he didn't find himself that much better for it.

Jesper spent the next two days wallowing in misery, in a semi-lethargic state, and feeling rather pathetic for it. He was being a coward and he knew it, but it was so hard when the only person you'd truly want to find comfort with, was also the source of your misery.

On the third morning, Poppy told him in no uncertain terms that if he didn't get up, wash, and shave, they would have him sleeping in the courtyard outside.

He obeyed, because he wasn't foolish enough to anger Poppy Njoroge, and he knew too well they’d follow through on the threat if he didn't get in line. In the end, the push had been beneficial, since he was feeling a lot more human once shaved and with a clean shirt on. When he added a coat on top, strapped his holsters around his hips, and placed a top hat over his head, courage returned, and the desire to see this through : to find Wylan and speak to him, for better or for worse.

Jesper's first stop was at the pawn shop, where he sold one of his fancy new hats. After some haggling, he got enough money out of it to last him at least a month, if he spent it wisely.

Once he was out on the street again, with kruge in his pocket, the temptation of betting it scratched at his mind. If he was lucky at the Makker's Wheel, maybe he could recuperate enough money to send his father, and make up for his loss. He quashed that thought, and instead, headed southbound toward Barkenstraat and the Slat. On his way, he tried to get the “fresh air” Poppy insisted he had to take, or, at least, as much fresh air as Ketterdam could provide.

He stopped on the sidewalk across from the Crow Club, eyeing the front door with a good amount of apprehension. Before he could make a decision, however, the front door opened and Nina stepped out, carrying an empty basket like someone on their way to shop at the food market. She was wearing a new, red wool winter cape with a grey fur collar, and she looked nice, but preoccupied. She lifted her skirts to go down the front steps, and when she arrived on the sidewalk, she lifted her gaze and caught sight of him.

“Jes!” Nina called out in surprise, jogging across the street to reach him.

“Hi,” he greeted her. He wanted to tell her she looked pretty, but he was less concerned with girls and more with boys right now… one in particular.

“Brekker said you'd come back at some point!”

“I'm not back precisely,” Jesper grunted, although unsure of what he meant by that. He just didn't like Kaz inferring he was predictable. “I’m not staying. I just want to speak to Wylan.”

She pulled a face. “He's not here.”

“What do you mean?”

“He's gone. He left two days ago, with his belongings,” Nina explained. “He hasn't been back since. Even Kaz doesn't know where he is.”

Wylan running away instead of facing problems head-on was a familiar tune. Jesper almost felt anger rising in him, but he knew he was being unfair. He had been the one who had run away this time, and made an even bigger mess of things, while Wylan had asked him to stay and talk. This was all Jesper's fault.

“Did he say where he was going?” he inquired without much hope for an answer. “Did he…” He was about to ask “did he leave a note?”, but bit back the words at the last moment.

“No,” Nina regretted with a shake of her head. An awkward silence stretched between the two of them, before she spoke up again : “I don't mean to put salt in your wounds, but he waited for you for two days, Jesper.” Her tone was compassionate, with yet a touch of reproach.

He swallowed thickly. “My wounds are plenty salty already.”

“Wylan was pretty upset when I told him Kaz found you at the Sweet Shop, and that you said you had no intention of coming back,” she went on, transferring the basket from her left arm to her right.

Breath caught in Jesper's throat in alarm. “You told him I was at the Sweet Shop!?”

She frowned. “Isn't that where you were?”

“Yes, but I wasn't there for that!” he exclaimed, voice a little strangled. “Saints, Nina! He must have thought I went straight to a brothel to have sex!”

She sucked in a breath in a visible cringe. “I'm sorry?”

Jesper removed his hat and ran a hand through his hair, resisting the urge to pull it. “Not your fault. Mine. As usual.”

“I think it's more complicated than that,” Nina pointed out with a tilt of her head, and Jesper had the strange feeling she was reading more than just his expression.

He changed the subject, although not by a lot. “If Wylan's been gone for days, I'm surprised Kaz hasn't tried to go retrieve his precious insurance by all means necessary.”

“I don't know what Kaz has been up to, to be perfectly honest,” she admitted. “I haven't seen him much since you left.”

Jesper snorted. “Well, don't count on him for transparency about his plans or intentions.” If his anger towards Wylan had morphed into something else, his view of Kaz was still very much tinted with grudge.

“So… you're really not coming back, then,” she surmised after a pause.

He shook his head, averting his gaze. “I don't know, Nina. I'm sorry. That's all I can offer for now.”

She shifted from foot to foot, like she was on the verge of saying something. Jesper hoped she was not going to beg him to help with the plan to free Matthias. He had a hard time resisting the urge to help a damsel in distress, and the idea of doing Kaz's bidding right now, even to help her, wasn't an appealing prospect. Fortunately, she said nothing about it. Instead, she patted him on the arm and wished him good luck before they went their separate ways ; her toward Little Ravka, and him further and deeper into the Barrel.

He headed towards Rozenstraat and Wylan’s workshop. If his boyfriend hadn't stuck around the Slat, surely there was a chance Jesper would find him there.

The door to the workshop was locked, and when Jesper knocked, nobody answered. He didn't try to use his durast powers to undo the mechanism, first of all because it felt intrusive, and second of all, because he knew Wylan used explosives to rig his door against intruders and Jesper valued the integrity of his facial features. In any case, the place felt cold and unused; as if no one had come here in several days.

Just to confirm his suspicions, he climbed onto a gutter pipe, doing his best not to ruin his clothes, and he was able to get a quick peek inside the workshop. As he expected, the place was dark and empty.

He should have expected that Wylan wouldn't be waiting around for him to reappear. Jesper should have come sooner, but he just couldn't muster the strength. He had been afraid that, fragile as he was in the last few days, if left to his own devices in the West Stave, he’d have relapsed and ended up in another gambling den. The temptation of it still tugged at all the right strings, making him feel very much like a puppet to a master much stronger than himself. Why should he feel miserable when he could be chasing the flurry of endorphins quick gains never failed to bring him? Gambling was an effective way to take his mind off his problems, even when most of his problems were caused by the gambling.

There was a third place where he could go and look for Wylan. It was logical and conceivable he might be there, although Jesper dreaded to set foot anywhere near the damn place.

The dread only intensified as Jesper made his way on foot through the financial district, then into the university area. He passed through the campus—a place where he hadn’t set foot in years. As he walked by a tall, red-brick building, memories surged. He had spent countless hours in that hall, attending long, grueling lectures on economics, during the brief time he had deceived himself into thinking he could earn a business degree. His father had once suggested he pursue law. "You're obstinate and shrewd enough to become a barrister," Colm had remarked one evening over supper. The thought of it now seemed profoundly absurd. The only thing Jesper had ever excelled at, regarding law, was being on the wrong side of it.

He followed the Geldcanal and its murky waters all the way down to the Geldin District, and, from there, reached the Geldstraat a little before two bells in the afternoon.

Jesper hadn't come here very often during the day. The only time he had approached any of the mansions was during a few robberies orchestrated by Kaz, and, admittedly, he hadn't been that focused on the architecture as much as the riches to steal, and the easiest ways in and out.

The Van Eck house wasn't a difficult one to spot. It was the last one on the straat, looming over the neighboring ones and commanding attention from every angle. Compared to this mansion, Rollins’ lavish country estate looked like a garden shed. The Van Eck crest, with its black laurel leaves, was displayed over the main gate.

The imposing, century-old stone façade was adorned with ornate carvings and intricate moldings, with tall, arched windows framed by elegant white shutters. The roofline, steep and gabled, was punctuated by dormer windows with copper details that had developed a greenish patina over the years. The wrought-iron fencing around the property wasn't meant to give privacy to the occupants so much as to display the wealth and opulence inside ; much like a display window. And Jesper was currently looking through that window, into a world he tried to picture as being Wylan’s.

Expansive gardens surrounded the mansion, with sculpted hedges, fountains, and flower beds that looked vibrant even at this time of year and under the gloomy sky. They were meticulously arranged in geometric patterns. Jesper imagined a little boy with wild chestnut hair and big hazel eyes, running across that garden, chasing the butterflies, reciting their scientific names, along with those of the flowers they landed on. Was he a happy boy, or a very sad one trying to wrestle any joy he could out of life?

“Your father must miss you.”

“No. I don't think he does,” Wylan had said with feelings, as they dug the inferni's grave together.

“Then, he's stupid. I would certainly miss that sweet face if I couldn't see it anymore. ”

And Jesper had not lied. He missed that face, painfully, and with more intensity with every new day he spent without Wylan.

A grey-haired gardener appeared around one of the hedgerows, pushing a wheelbarrow filled with folded tarps, his assistants in tow – two lanky young men with faces and hands smeared with dirt.

“Hi! Excuse me!” Jesper hailed them through the fence. The older gardener went on his way, ignoring him, but the two helpers stopped, curious.

“What business?” asked one of them; the tallest one. He had a smudge of mud on his forehead, as if someone had tried to draw a third eyebrow above his left one.

“Has …Wylan… come back home?” Jesper asked with hesitation. For some reason, it seemed absurd that they would even know who he was referring to.

The two gardeners exchanged a look. “You mean young master Van Eck?”

“Yes,” Jesper encouraged, trying not to sound too eager.

The shorter of the two gardeners, the less dirty one, eyed Jesper with a hint of suspicion. “Are you a journalist?” he asked.

“No, just… a concerned friend.”

“I didn't know he had any of those,” the taller gardener said easily, and Jesper's heart tightened at that. “Nobody has seen him since his father sent him to boarding school a few months back,” the man went on. “Apparently, he ran away before he could get to Belendt.”

“Sweet kid,” the other added, shoving his hands into the pockets of his grass-stained trousers. “Very shy; very polite. And he played the flute quite well.”

“That's true,” the one with mud on his forehead acquiesced. “He came into the garden pavilion to practice, because the master didn't like it when he played in the house; said the sound was infernal.”

Jesper's insides squeezed again, in a most unpleasant way. The picture it painted of the life at the Van Eck mansion was far from idyllic. “Between you and I, how is Jan Van Eck as a master?” he asked carefully.

They gave each other a sidelong glance and their silence turned uncomfortable.

The older gardener, the one with the grey hair and the wheelbarrow, hailed his workers. “Come on, boys! We've got work to do!”

He had been wrapping the protective tarps around some topiary a short distance away, within earshot, and Jesper got the strange impression that he had intervened at this precise moment so they would not have to answer the question.

The tallest of the workers tipped his newsboy cap at Jesper. “Good day, sir.”

Jesper replied in kind, and was left alone to ponder on the sidewalk.

None of what he had heard was a stellar endorsement of Van Eck’s qualities as a boss. The reverse would've been surprising. He was known for being a ruthless businessman, and a ruthless employer… It didn't bode well for his qualities as a father.

Ever since he had met Wylan, Jesper had always sensed that something was amiss, and Nina had confirmed it : he was scared. He had been on the run from something, or someone, and Jesper was starting to feel this someone could only be his own father.

And where was Wylan now?

Jesper didn't know where else to look. There was the Cumulus, of course, where Wylan had once worked, but setting foot in a gambling hall would be the height of stupidity. And with that, Jesper’s search had reached a dead end pretty quickly; so fast in fact that his face almost hurt from hitting that wall. And to the nasty cocktail of emotions he had been ingesting for days, another one had just been added : fear.

***

Poppy was sitting at their vanity, writing a letter as Jesper walked in. They only took a quick peek at him through the reflection in the mirror before saying: “I take this didn't go as you wished…”

The disappointment and tension must have shown on Jesper's face more than he expected. He gave Poppy a brief summary of his visit at the Crow Club, Wylan’s workshop and the Van Eck estate, as he put his top hat on a hook by the door and shrugged his coat off. He did not want to dwell on today’s events and his miserable failure at fixing anything. “Do you want me to brush your black wig for you?” he offered instead, gesturing toward the wig he knew Poppy would need for the first act of their show.

“I'm not performing tonight,” they informed him, placing the letter in an envelope and sealing it.

“What are you doing here, then?”

Poppy swiveled on the chair with a smile. “I wanted to see how my favorite mbwa aliyepotea was doing.”

Jesper rolled his eyes with a snort. “You don't need to remind me I'm…. that.”

“A stray puppy?” they teased gently.

“Exactly.” He walked up to the door and took the top hat he had just discarded. “If you’re not working, I'm taking you out for dinner, then.” They both had to eat, he needed the distraction, and now that he had sold one of his hats, he had enough money to treat them both to something nice.

“What’s the occasion?” Poppy inquired, reaching for their own, long, white fur coat.

Jesper was faster, and grabbed the coat to help his friend put their arms through the sleeves. “I'm trying to be a gentleman and repay a fraction of your kindness, you've been a doll, and a real friend and I don't deserve you.”

“You're right,” Poppy said with a grin and a wink aimed at Jesper over their shoulder. “I'm quite marvelous.”

“You really are.”

They walked to the Kooperom arm in arm, with Poppy entertaining Jesper with idle gossip about some mutual zemeni acquaintances. For a change, he was grateful not to have much to contribute to the conversation, although, his lack of implication made him worried he'd be of poor company throughout the dinner.
The space inside the restaurant was intimate; old-fashioned yet inviting, with lace curtains at the windows, letting in the glow of the dimming twilight. Dark oak paneling lined the walls, while brass sconces cast a warm, golden light across the room.

A waiter guided them past the antique bar to their table by one of the windows offering a view of Third Harbor.
Poppy ordered the herring and Jesper the smoked eel. The waiter brought them a decanter and silver-rimmed glasses, and they drank the light, fruity red wine while waiting for their dishes.

Besides the clinking of cutlery and the hum of conversations from the patrons at adjacent tables, the air was filled with soft music from a piano in the far corner of the dining room. Jesper couldn't see the pianist from where he was sitting, but he spied the green hem of a nightgown trailing over the edge of the bench and concluded it was most likely a woman.

The music lulled Jesper’s preoccupied mind into a reverie, or, to be precise, into a memory : Wylan’s fingers conjuring a graceful melody on the piano at Pekka Rollins’ country house. It had been one of the most beautiful things Jesper had ever heard, maybe because Wylan was also the prettiest man Jesper had ever touched. Hearing this music, it had felt like catching a glimpse of the fine golden thread keeping the pieces of Wylan's soul sewn and embroidered together. In hindsight, this was probably the precise moment when Jesper had fallen in love with him. And right now, the man Jesper loved was somewhere out there, and to imagine him alone and scared, on the run once again, it was pulling apart the pieces of Jesper's own soul.
Poppy cleared their throat.

Jesper blinked, snapping back to reality, and wondered how long he had stayed silent, staring into space. His friend didn't look upset, however; concerned, if anything.

“Penny for your thoughts?”

He heaved a sorrowful sigh. “If you have 100 000 kruge to spare, I'd take that…”

If it hadn't been for his father, the farm and the threat of Colm having to mortgage it if his son did not reimburse him, Jesper wouldn't care about the money. He would gladly give 100 000 kruge away if it meant having Wylan by his side : or jump back in time before the argument even happened.

Poppy reached across the table, their fingers finding Jesper’s. “You were thinking about Wylan just now.” It wasn't a question.

Throat tightening, Jesper nodded.

“You truly loved him, huh?”

He dropped his eyes without uttering a response. A simple “yes” felt inadequate. He didn't want to say “I did” either, because using the past tense would be like admitting it was likely over between them, which he couldn't bear, and saying “I do love him” would be just as painful somehow.

After a moment, Jesper found his voice again, past the lump in his throat. “I know he’s a grown man. He's clever, and he managed to survive without me before I showed up in his life. But I'm scared for him, Pyp.” He looked up at his friend, somewhat ashamed of the tears misting his eyes. “I just wish he had spoken to me… or even Nina, told us what was going on. I think he’s in more trouble than I realized, and I just want him to be safe, and happy.”

“Yes, I can see that”, Poppy said softly, squeezing his fingers. “And despite what you might think of yourself, you're a good man, Jesper. I wouldn't be your friend if you weren't.”

“Thank you.” He sucked in a deep breath to steady himself and put on a brave face. He had taken Poppy out to thank them, not to host his own pity party, so he plastered a smile upon his face with practiced ease, hoping it would hang there for the rest of the meal. He switched to Zemeni to tell a joke he had been waiting to share with someone who'd understand the reference.

***

Jesper congratulated himself on staying clear of drunkenness. He was just slightly on the right side of light-headed when Poppy and he reached the Blue Paradise later in the evening. He was grateful he hadn't walked back on his own. Otherwise, the temptation of slipping through the door of any gaming parlor on the way, just to take the edge of his worries off, would have been too great, and Ghezen knew there were many gambling dens on the way between the Koperom and the Paradise.

Jesper had managed to numb his own heartache for the rest of the evening up to now, but as Poppy opened the door of the dressing room to let him in, the pain and turmoil came back at the thought of another night in a camp bed, with his own thoughts as sole company.

Only, the dressing room wasn't empty when they walked in.

Two familiar silhouettes occupied the armchairs : one curvy, with wavy hair and a wide skirt, the other one stiff and pale, with gloved hands over the pommel of a cane.

Jesper’s initial surprise morphed into irritation. His eyes shifted from Kaz and Nina to Poppy. “Did you send for them?” he asked in a slight hiss.

“I did,” Poppy confirmed, unapologetic, but their voice was soft when they said : “We both know you can't stay here forever, Mpenzi.”

Crossing his arms, Jesper put his attention back on the other Crows. “Is this some sort of intervention?”

“In a way,” Nina provided with a shrug.

Kaz rose from the chair, leaning on his cane in a heavier manner than usual, as if it cost him. “We need you, Jes. I need you,” he declared, blue eyes focused and intent.

It was the first time Kaz ever called him “Jes” with absolutely no trace of sarcasm or mockery.

After a brief silence, Jesper straightened his shoulders and maintained the scowl he had willed onto his face. “Well…I might need your skills too, so perhaps, we can make a deal.”

Chapter Text

"That's the deal, Jesper," Kaz repeated, linking his gloved hands together and resting them on the desk.

Jesper grunted. "It's a shit deal, because either way you get what you want." Why had he ever thought he could negotiate with Kaz Brekker? The man was as flexible as a slab of marble. Jesper leaned forward, palms flat against the desk, and locked eyes with his boss. "You need to find Wylan as much as I do. So why not work together, right now?"

Kaz didn't flinch. He held Jesper's gaze, unblinking. "We will. After we pull Helvar from prison. That comes first. Then we go after your merchling."

Jesper's jaw tightened. "Why not free Helvar tonight, then? Get it done! Nina would be ecstatic."

"Because we need Inej," Kaz replied, his tone flat.

Jesper straightened up, clicking his tongue to stifle his frustration. "But it could be weeks before Inej even gets your message. What if the trail goes cold by then? What if Wylan leaves the country?"

Kaz pretended to tidy up a pile of papers on the corner of the desk. “Somehow, I doubt he will.”

Jesper narrowed his eyes. “And how do you know that?”

Kaz gave a one-shoulder shrug. “Call it an instinct.”

Jesper let out an angry huff and turned on his heels. He would have loved to slam the door of Kaz's office on his way out, but Wylan's explosives had done such a number on the lock that the bloody thing was just hanging open at all times now, much to Kaz’s own dismay.

It had been naive of Jesper to think Kaz would help him find Wylan out of the goodness of his heart. In reality, Jesper hadn’t truly expected that, knowing Kaz had his own vested interest in locating Wylan. But he hadn’t anticipated Kaz using it as a bargaining chip either. The deal Kaz had presented was simple enough: help me free Matthias Helvar, and I'll find your boyfriend. But now, three days had passed since Jesper returned to the Slat, and nothing had progressed on either front. Jesper had given his word to help with the prison break—why wasn’t that enough? Instead, they were all waiting for Inej to return, while precious time slipped away when they could be searching for Wylan. But no. Kaz was content to keep Jesper working for him, dangling the promise of Wylan’s whereabouts just out of reach, until Jesper proved his worth and fulfilled his part of the deal.

Despite his frustration, he was still grateful for the work. Without it, the restlessness of this endless wait would have been unbearable. Working at the Crow Club gave him the sense of normalcy he desperately needed. It was familiar ground—minding the door, charming customers, helping Kaz vet and hire new floor staff. He was in his element there, as if he'd been thrown back several months, before the job with the Sun Summoner even came about. But that wasn't entirely true, because everything had changed since then. There was now an empty, Wylan-shaped space beside him; a constant, unshakeable reminder of what was lost.

The nights were the worst; the absence of Wylan at its most glaring. Every night, Jesper lay in bed with a pillow tucked to his chest, filling the spot where Wylan should be. The pillow didn't give off any warmth, and it was a pale surrogate to the real, live, wonderful body of his man. If he screwed his eyes shut, he could at least imagine the presence ; enough to grab at least a couple hours of fretful sleep.

Jesper had always been more of a night owl than a morning lark, but these days, he woke early to make a daily trek across town. He needed to be back in time for the Crow Club to open in the afternoon. Every day, he followed the same route: from the Crow Club to Wylan's workshop, then on to the tanneries, followed by a stroll down Dekselstraat to pass by Club Cumulus—just in case—and finally to the Geldstraat.

At Wylan’s workshop, Jesper reached the same conclusion every time: no one had been there since they’d both left the morning after the firepox heist. As for the tanneries ; there were actually a few of them around the same block, up the West Stave. He had no idea which one had employed Wylan, so he was condemned to walk around, hoping he'd run into his boyfriend by chance or miracle. He doubted Wylan would have gone back to working there of his own volition, though, not with that many kruge in his pocket. The stench was hard to bear, and Jesper was no stranger to the city's foul smells. It was worth a try anyway.

Each time he walked by the Cumulus, the establishment was closed. His search would undoubtedly be more fruitful if he came back during business hours and actually spoke to someone, but allowing himself to be on his own in a gambling house felt like handing a loaded gun to a monkey. The only reason why he hadn't relapsed since coming back to the Crow Club was because Kaz kept him occupied and watched him like a hawk. He also had some members of his old gang : Annika, Pim, Raske, Rotty, who knew of Jesper's tendencies, and intended on keeping him accountable.

As for the Geldstraat and the Van Eck mansion, Jesper held out hope that he’d catch a glimpse of Wylan coming in or out at some point, but it hadn’t happened yet. He couldn’t exactly approach the front door and ask to see him. He hadn’t seen the gardeners again, nor had he spoken to any of the staff. Still, he knew that sooner or later, someone would notice him—the same zemeni chap standing at the gate every morning, looking in like a lost, yearning ghost. Jesper didn’t really care.

Every time Jesper returned from his morning walk, he would find Nina sitting at a table inside, waiting. “Any news? Have you seen him?” she’d ask. He would shake his head, answering that there had been no sign of Wylan. She would sigh, and they’d exchange a few words of small talk before going about their day. Jesper had no doubt Nina cared deeply for Wylan, but he suspected her concern for the demo man was also a way to avoid thinking about Matthias. The two of them could see their own, unresolved sorrow reflected in the other’s face.

After a few days of this routine, silence became the norm. There was simply nothing new to report. Jesper would enter the Crow Club, hang his coat by the door, and Nina would glance up at him. He’d shake his head in silence, she'd give an apologetic shrug, and then they would be like two flotsams passing each other in the harbor and drifting off in their separate directions.

It went on like this for three weeks.

Every day, Jesper woke up with the faint hope that today would be the day he’d hear a knock on the front door and Wylan would be standing there in the wind and rain, staring at Jesper with those wide, hazel eyes, and his satchel strapped to his back. It didn't happen, and the hope was fraying.

One night, Jesper sat at the desk in his bedroom with two sheets of paper and a graphite pencil. The mere idea of having to put words on paper, those words, made his throat tight. He had to do it. He had to put some semblance of order to his life, but the thought in itself was scary beyond belief.

“Hello Da,” Jesper started writing, then stopped. He stared out the window for a moment, leg bouncing under the desk, wondering where to go from there. He hadn't sent a letter to Colm in more than six months. Perhaps, his father wouldn't even recognize the sloppy, slanted handwriting. “It's Jes,” he wrote next, just in case.

That, at least, was a start.

“I'm sorry I haven't written in so long. You must have been wondering if I was even still alive.”

It was meant as a joke of sorts, but Jesper paused again, thinking. What if Colm was, in fact, thinking exactly that? What if he was worried out of his mind? Then, it would all be Jesper’s fault. He ought not to joke about it, at least. With a grunt, and without thinking, he crumpled the sheet into a ball and threw it over his shoulder. Now he only had one sheet left ; only one other chance at this. He took a deep breath, like someone standing on a cliff, about to take a dive into the sea.

Hello Da. It’s Jes.

I'm sorry I haven't written in so long. I’m sure you’ve been worried and wondering why I failed to get in touch. I’m sorry I haven't written sooner. I’m sorry about many things, in fact. You will be angry when you read this. Maybe, you’ll even hate me. I wouldn't blame you for it. I've given you a thousand headaches since Mama passed away, and I hate that I'm about to give you another one; the worst one so far, without a doubt.

I know you think I’m busy with my last semester at university, but the truth is, I haven’t attended a class in over a year and a half. I’m a drop-out, and I’ve been lying to you about it. I don’t think university was ever right for me. Remember when I told you I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to sit through long lectures? I was right. I turned out to be a self-fulfilling prophecy, and I’m sure you won’t be surprised to hear that.

At first, I didn’t tell you I had quit. I thought I was protecting you, afraid of disappointing you. But things only got worse. I fell in with the wrong crowd and ended up racking up a substantial gambling debt. I used the money you sent for tuition to pay it off. After that, things spiraled even further. When I wrote to you asking for money to enroll in extracurricular economics classes, that wasn’t true. The money went to keeping the sharks away for a while.

I always intended to repay you. I convinced myself that if I just hung on a little longer, the dice would roll in my favor, and I’d be able to send the money back to you. But I’m beginning to see that it was never going to work this way. I know I can’t undo what I’ve done, but I will repay you, Da. I promise. Soon.

Van Eck had promised them 30 million kruge. If Jesper survived the ice court, not only would he be able to repay his father, but he’d be in a position of making him a very rich man too. Colm would be able to retire from the backbreaking work of jurda farming. He’d never have to worry about anything anymore.

You must be wondering why I’m telling you all of th

“Shit!” Jesper muttered in frustration as the tip of his pencil snapped mid-word. He yanked open the top drawer of his desk and fumbled through it, certain he’d seen a pocket knife somewhere inside. Then his fingers brushed against something soft. He pulled it out, his breath catching in his throat. It was the silk neckerchief he'd bought for Wylan on their first trip to the tailor. His pulse quickened, heart thumping in his chest. Slowly, he wrapped it around his wrist, tied it, and brought it to his nose. The faint, familiar scent clung to the fabric—Wylan's scent. A wave of emotion seized him, and tears threatened to spill, but he held them back, biting his lip. He rubbed the tip of his nose to the silk, closing his eyes for a fleeting moment, imagining it was Wylan's soft skin, his neck beneath his touch. If only he were here, within reach of his fingers, his lips. Ghezen! He missed him so much.

Jesper found the pocket knife in the second drawer. Once the pencil was sharp enough, he returned to his work. He wasn’t an author—certainly not a poet—but he still needed to find the right words for his father to understand.

You must be wondering why I’m telling you all of this now. That’s because I met someone, Da. His name is Wylan. He's so beautiful – like something out of a fairytale.

Jesper blushed as he wrote this. In the absence of a mother, his father had been the one to hear about his teenage crushes. This wasn’t uncharted territory. But none of the fleeting infatuations of his youth could compare to what Wylan meant to him. Perhaps that’s what made him so flustered.

He makes me think of a sìobhragan – you know, those magical woodland sprites from the stories you read to me as a child? And he's smart too, so clever and kind, and he smells like lavender. When we were together, he and I, it felt effortless, like we always belonged with one another. But I've lost him, and with that, everything spiraled out of control once again. I lost a lot of money at the gaming tables. I think I've always been better at losing things than keeping them.

I’ve hit rock bottom, Da. But you always told me that when you’re there, the only way to go is up. I have to find Wylan, and when I do, I need to be the man he deserves. He deserves better than this. I have to make amends. That’s why I’m writing to y–

An urgent knock on the door interrupted him. “Jesper! Come to my office. I need to speak to you and Nina,” Kaz ordered from the hallway.

“I'm busy!” Jesper snarled, fingers tightening around his pen. He was off duty tonight. Kaz had no hold on him…technically.

“Whatever you’re doing can wait,” Kaz insisted. “We’re freeing Helvar tonight.”

“Tonight as in ‘now’ ?”

“Isn't that what I've just said? Come on!”

“But-” Jesper tried to protest. He stared at the unfinished letter with a twist in his guts.

A hard thud of cane against the door showed Kaz's already thin patience was wearing out. “There’s no time to waste!”

With a sigh, Jesper put his pen down, stood and went to open the door. “What about Inej?” he asked, once he came face to face with his boss.

“She’s already waiting for you at Fourth Harbor,” Kaz declared. He was wearing an orange robe over his clothes and the beaked mask of the Madman propped on his head. The sight in itself was odd ; a murderer in a carnival costume. Kaz shoved a bundle of red fabric into Jesper's arms without further ado. “Put that on and join us. We leave at eleven. ”

***

The water of Fourth Harbor appeared viscous ; a dark expanse of tar under the cloudy sky. A putrid smell floated in the air, crawling between the barges moored at the piers and the skeletons of abandoned fishing boats resting on the shore like dead whales. A few stray snowflakes fell on the fabric of Jesper’s cape, clinging there for a few seconds before shrinking in on themselves. It was nearly midnight and still no sign of Inej.

Jesper checked the hull of the rowboat for the third time, looking for any weak spots or holes. The prospect of having to row across the harbour was far from rejoicing already, but, on top of that, he didn't trust the rat-faced man who had rented him the craft. The stillness of the sea out there was just an illusion. The closer you got to Hellgate Island, the stronger the undercurrent, and Jesper had no desire to test his swimming skills in the icy, polluted water.

“Good night, Jes,” said a voice behind him.

Jesper almost dropped his lantern as he spun around. “Holy Mother of Saint!” he cursed, clutching at his chest. Even when he was already on edge, and expecting Inej to appear at any moment, she still managed to sneak up on him.

“Inej,” he simply said, taking in her appearance. Normally, he would've rushed to her, to hug her and spin her around. It had been almost a month since the last time he’d seen her, and they had never been separated that long since they had met. They just remained mute for what seemed like minutes, staring at one another. There was a distinct heaviness in the air. She seemed prepared to the fact he wouldn't be greeting her with his usual effusive joy and affection.

Inej was wearing the Grey Imp costume Wylan had used for the firepox heist, and her face was hidden behind the familiar horned mask, but she had made no effort to conceal the long dark plait of hair falling across the front of her shoulder. She pulled the mask up and off her face.

“Did you really have to wear that one?” Jesper asked, with biting bitterness in his tone, gesturing at her outfit.

Inej had obviously understood the reference, because she sighed and simply said: “I'm sorry about Wylan.”

Jesper crossed his arms, knowing he was being petulant, and perhaps even petty. Kaz had chosen that costume, not her. “What part are you sorry about?” he asked, the lingering pain of betrayal made fresh again upon seeing her.

“Everything, I suppose. Kaz told me not to say anything to you about who Wylan really was,” Inej admitted.

“I figured as much,” Jesper groaned. “For some reason, I thought you'd tell me anyway, for my own good, but I was wrong.”

“I didn't feel it was my secret to reveal.” In the flickering light casted by the lantern, he saw her pinch her lips in what looked like genuine regret. It pulled at the right strings of Jesper's heart. “But, if it counts for anything,” Inej continued, “I wanted no part in it. I tried to convince Kaz not to use you, or me, to bind Wylan to the Crows, and I told him you'd be hurt if you found out. But, you know Kaz…”

Jesper tightened his arms around himself.

Inej closed the distance between them and put a careful hand on his arm, reassuring, maternal, but not condescending. “I'm sorry for the role I played in it, Jesper,” she said, looking up at him, her dark eyes wide and earnest. “I really am. I get why you feel betrayed.”

It was his turn to heave a deep sigh. He put the lantern down on top of a nearby barrel, and drew her into his arms, holding her tight between the folds of his red cape. He could never be mad at her for long when he had her nearby. He loved her too much. “I missed you, Munchkin.”

“I missed you too, Stringbean,” Inej teased back, resting her head on his chest, over his heart. “I think Wylan genuinely cares about you, though,” she whispered in the dark after a moment of silent companionship.

Jesper swallowed around the damn lump in his throat. “Well, I've said and done some bad things, and he's gone now. Ghezen knows if I'll ever see him again.”

She burrowed further into his embrace. “I'm so sorry, Jes. I know you loved him.”

He didn't want to answer that, and besides, the clock was ticking. They had to reach the island before two bells. He stepped back. “Come on, Nej. We've got a Fjerdan to get out of jail.”

Inej helped Jesper pull the boat into the water, and it took him nearly a full bell to navigate the treacherous channel between the harbor and Terrenjel Islands. There was still some distance to go. Much to his relief, the boat didn't take on water, but his concern was the fog creeping low over the surface. That’s what happened when the water was warmer than the air. The fog, combined with the night’s darkness, hid the jagged rocks that jutted out of the waves—rocks that could tear the hull of their small craft like a knife through butter. All Jesper could do was row, trusting Inej, who held the lantern at the prow, to warn him if she spotted any obstacles ahead.

Jesper still used this opportunity to inquire about Inej's progress in finding her parents and her brother. In the month she had been at sea, he and Mal had dismantled two slavers’ ships, but still hadn't been able to locate the man who had sold Inej to the Menagerie.

Fortunately, after a while, they discerned the silhouettes of other rowboats heading toward Hellgate. Jesper maneuvered the oars to follow them. If those boats didn’t sink, it meant the route was safe. One boat passed them, about ten meters away, and Jesper made out the outline of a Madman’s mask on one of the passengers' heads, along with the white veil of a Lost Bride. He wondered if this was the boat that had brought Kaz, Nina, and Muzzen—one of the Dregs who was supposed to act as a body double for Matthias—to Hellgate. They had departed from Fifth Harbor, while Inej and Jesper had left from the Fourth. Jesper kept quiet, just in case it wasn’t them. There would be plenty of revelers wearing costumes heading to Hellgate tonight to enjoy the Hellshow, as it was Sankt Piotr Day—another occasion for Ketterdamians and tourists alike to dress up as their favorite Komedie Brute character.

Earlier, during their briefing, Nina had told Jesper and Kaz all about what she’d witnessed at the Hellshow—how the Dime Lions and Pekka ran the event, and how Matthias had been forced to fight wolves, resulting in the death of a guard. Jesper had heard of the Hellshow before, as most people in the Barrel had, but he’d never been interested in that kind of entertainment. Along with cockfighting and dogfighting, it was just distasteful to him. He’d grown up surrounded by animals and had far more respect for them than for most humans.

As they neared Hellgate Island, the fog lifted, carried away by the colder currents from the North. All the boats were heading toward the pier, which led to the old, ruined tower where the show was taking place. But that wasn’t where Jesper was going. Inej blew on the kerosene flame inside the lantern to extinguish it, not wanting to draw attention. They would have to row blindly toward another entrance to the tower.

The tunnel where Kaz had instructed him to moor was the former service entrance, used for delivering food and other supplies to the prisoners and guards. Now that the prison had moved to the new tower, it was no longer in use. It hadn’t been practical anyway, as it was only accessible at low tide. This meant that Kaz and Nina had just two hours to make the switch between Matthias and Muzzen, before the tunnel filled with water, cutting their escape route.

Finally, Jesper got Inej and himself to the tunnel exit without incident. He was the first to jump out, water sloshing around his boots. Using his Grisha senses, he located an old metal eyelet protruding from the stone wall and tied the mooring rope to it. Meanwhile, Inej lit the lantern again. She grabbed a cloth bag from the bottom of the boat and tossed it to Jesper, who caught it easily.

She handed him the lantern and, as she passed him, grabbed his hand, squeezing his fingers lightly. “No mourners,” she whispered.

“No funeral,” he whispered back. And before he could draw his next breath, she had vanished into the shadows.
Jesper couldn’t stay there, awestruck by her stealth, because he had to change into the prison guard uniform in the cloth bag. He did it as quickly as possible, stuffing his cape and mask into the bag and hiding it at the bottom of the rowboat.

Somehow, the uniform, which hadn’t been tailored for him, still fit perfectly. He could feel it in the way the seams sat on his shoulders and the trousers clung to his hips and backside. He must have looked absolutely dashing, though, sadly, there was no reflective surface to confirm his suspicions. For a moment, he wondered how Wylan would feel about a man in uniform. He certainly seemed to appreciate the view of Jesper in Ravkan soldier’s garb when they’d been at the fortress. Jesper let out an audible groan. He had hoped the adrenaline of the heist would keep his mind off Wylan, at least for a little while, but it seemed his thoughts kept drifting back to him. He couldn’t let himself be distracted. He had to focus on the task at hand.

He pulled out the spare pocket watch Kaz had lent him. It was half past two bells. There was still a little time for him to get a lay of the land before he had to play his part.

Walking up the dark, damp tunnel, one of his revolvers drawn, he stayed alert for any suspicious noises. When he spotted some light ahead and heard the echo of voices, he blew out the lantern’s flame and left it behind a rock.

The voices ahead receded, but the light remained. Soon, Jesper emerged in what was undoubtedly one of the old cell blocks.

The smell was almost unbearable — a mix of urine, excrement, rotting meat, the sweat of fear, and something rancid he couldn’t even begin to identify. It almost made him long for the stench of the harbor and the tanneries.

Jesper stayed hidden in the shadows, crouched behind a hay cart. But it soon became clear that he was alone in the room, so he began to explore. If he got caught, his uniform would provide a convenient excuse: a new recruit who had gotten a bit too curious.

Along one of the walls was a row of large cages. Each had wheels underneath so the guards could easily roll them to the arena. The first cage contained a snow leopard, its fur matted with feces and scorched in places. The second housed a scrawny tiger with one missing eye, while the next contained another tiger—better off than the first, though not by much. Jesper stopped at the fourth cage, his gaze locking with that of a truly formidable beast: a giant boar from the Wandering Isle. His father had told him stories about these creatures—massive, the size of a cow. This one had long, sharp tusks stained with something brown. Dried blood? Jesper shuddered at the thought. "You look like one nasty bugger," he whispered.

A sharp intake of breath escaped him as he noticed a bear, clearly sick. Its bloodshot eyes and the greenish foam at the corners of its mouth were a pitiful sight.

He was snapped out of his compassionate musings by a snarl from the sixth cage: a pair of wolves. They had to be the same ones Matthias had fought in his last combat. In the next cage, a bull eyed him warily, its horns outfitted with sharp metal tips to make it even more deadly. Nearby, another series of cages housed an elephant, a jungle cat from the South Colonies and three hyenas.

Jesper’s mission was to unleash these animals—each dangerous in its own right—onto unsuspecting spectators and guards, creating panic and confusion that would allow Kaz, Nina, and Inej to smuggle Matthias out of his cell amidst the chaos. To do so, he had to somehow open the padlocked door. With his Grisha skills, that should be a straightforward task.

Voices, footsteps and the metallic creaking of wheels forced him to retreat behind a water tank in the corner of the room. The pair of chatting guards wheeled one cage in, and took another out. “They won't have Helvar fight the wolves again,” one of the guards was telling the other as they walked away. “The damn things sided with him. So Rollins rigged the game so he’d fight the boar instead.”

Jesper gritted his teeth. If Matthias got killed fighting that beast, it would seriously derail the general plan, and he couldn't imagine the distress Nina would feel, but there was nothing he could do about it at this point.

Once the men had taken the boar away, Jesper stepped out of his hiding place.

In the new cage, a monstrous reptile flicked its tongue to taste the air. Jesper recognized it as a venomous dragon lizard, a rare creature he'd seen in a book once. He had assumed the Dime Lions were simply bragging about having such a monster in the Hell Show as a stunt to attract gullible tourists. It seemed, however, that they had been telling the truth. The lizard had blood and white mucus dripping out of its mouth. Jesper suspected the blood might not be the lizard's own.

A fight between a Druskelle and a giant boar could only last for a few minutes before one was defeated. Jesper had limited time to act before the guards would be back. He checked the pocket watch again. It was a quarter to three bells. Matthias had just gotten into the ring. Should he wait? Kaz had said three bells. He better start working now.

Jesper made his careful way back to the cages. He went to the snow leopard's to inspect the padlock. Upon taking it in his hand, he cursed. He had expected and hoped for iron, but those were bronze. “I fucking hate bronze,” he muttered. The door hinges were made of the same metal, as were the bars. Alloys were a lot more complicated to manipulate than pure metals and he hadn’t practiced on bronze enough to truly understand it. The leopard growled, showing teeth, but remained at the bottom of the cage.

Jesper closed his fist around the padlock, and concentrated his skill through his finger bones, but the power fizzled out upon transferring from his skin to the object. He wasn't able to pierce through the surface. He tried, and tried again, nervousness mounting with every new failure.

By now, the fight was well underway and the clock was ticking. Through the corridor going up to the arena, he could hear the squealing of the giant boar and the roaring of the crowd.

Sweat dampened the back of his neck, his hair rising on his arms as Jesper made another attempt to apply his small science to the padlock, but despite his effort, the material kept resisting him. He hadn’t brought any additional tools, positive that prison fixtures were all iron.

If only Wylan was there. He would've found a solution already; he would've known what to do. He'd have concocted one of his chemical compounds and melted the locks, just like he had done to the one on Kaz's office door. “Damn it! I told you we needed a demo man, Kaz!” Jesper cursed his boss under his breath. Jesper needed his little firecracker of a chemist boyfriend right now, in more than one way. But Wylan wasn't there, and Jesper had to find a solution by himself. If the heist went sideways, Kaz would never forgive him. His palms were getting clammy and his fingers were twitchy around the unresponsive metal.

The noises and cheers of the crowd had increased volume and intensity, before going suspiciously quiet. Heart thumping, Jesper took this as a cue to seek cover again. He abandoned the padlock, went back behind the water tank and waited, his eyes down on the pocket watch; only two minutes to three bells.

At last the guards came. They did not bring the boar back, maybe because hauling a corpse all the way down here wasn't worth it. Jesper inferred that the fight had gone Matthias’ way, but there was no telling in what state the Fjerdan would be.

The guards wheeled the one-eyed tiger away, as the feline growled and hissed.

Jesper stepped out of the shadows. With one minute to spare, he was still confronted to the problem of the padlocks. He tried to apply his durast skills to the one on the bear’s cage, clenching his fingers around it to the point of pain. He felt a scorching heat go down the length of his arm, and when he inspected the padlock, he noticed the metal had deformed slightly where his fingers had been pressed. Nothing impressive; nothing useful.

He checked the watch again. “Fucking saints!” It was three bells sharp.

He forced the panic down. He could not do anything with the bronze on the cages, but he had plenty of practice and ease with his revolvers. Using guns here was reckless. The cell block had a high ceiling and the sound traveled well. The crowd around the pit was noisy, but since he had no idea where all of the guards were posted, there was a true possibility the sound of successive gunshots would attract attention to him before the animals could have the chance to go very far. The gunshots themselves weren't the only problem; the sound of bullets hitting the padlocks would also be loud as well, unless…

Modifying his guns, affecting the velocity of his bullets ; these were things Jesper had done time and time again, maybe not to that extent, but he had no other choice than to try.

He pulled out one of his revolvers, screwed his eyes shut in concentration and closed his other hand around the chamber, pulling and gathering the iron particles to seal it shut. He wouldn't be able to add more bullets until he undid the seal, but this was all he could do to reduce the noise of the firing. He opened his eyes and aimed at the padlock on the bear’s cage. Beads of sweat ran down his forehead, past his brows, getting caught in his eyelashes. He pulled the trigger, focusing all his might on making sure the bullet was propelled out of the barrel slowly enough not to make too much of a noise, but quick enough to damage the padlock.

The resulting sound was still louder than he would have liked, but it worked. The shackle broke and the rest of the padlock fell to the ground with a clunk. Jesper had no time for hesitation. By the time the bear would realize it could walk free, the other animals had to be freed too, or else Jesper would have to contend with a bunch of hungry, desperate beasts as he shot his remaining bullets.

He aimed for the bull’s cage, then the other ones in successive shots, until all the padlocks lay unusable on the ground.

The wolves had already stepped out, and Jesper scurried away, not wanting to be there when all hell would break loose, and praying none of the animals would think of pursuing him.

He ambled down the dark, damp tunnel. It was about 3:05, he reckoned, although it was too dark for him to check the watch. He retrieved his lantern behind the rock where he had left it, and just as he did, the first screams and sounds of mayhem fused from behind him.

He hurried through the tunnel to the sea where the rowboat waited. The water level had already risen significantly. He sat in the boat, both revolvers drawn and resting over his knees. All he had to do now was wait ... idle, in the dark, alone with his own thoughts, while the other Crows were out there in the heart of the chaos and action. He almost envied them in a twisted sort of way.

It now occurred to him that Dhòmhnaill was here somewhere, on this island. Not in this building, perhaps, but in the new fortress. Following the same train of thought, Jesper's heart dropped. What if Wylan was here too? What if the reason why Jesper hadn't been able to find him was because he'd been arrested too, for the explosion at the brewery? Jesper had the sudden impulse to jump out of the boat, abandon his post and run across the island, to break into the new cell blocks, all guns blazing. The idea that Wylan might be here somewhere, subjected to the whims and potential abuse of dangerous men: it made him nauseous. He gripped the handles of his revolvers with more force than what was necessary. “No,” he tried to rationalize. The news of arrests and trials were public knowledge ; recorded in newspapers. If Wylan had been arrested, Kaz would’ve known it. He clung to this half-certitude in order to remain quiet and still. He had to prevent himself from doing anything rash, even though every ounce of him was screaming for Wylan. Jesper wouldn't rest until he knew his lover was safe, preferably in his arms, although that last part was perhaps a little too optimistic.

He still had Wylan's neckerchief tied around his left wrist, hidden in his sleeve like a lucky charm. He reached for it with his other hand, stroking the silk as a means of distraction and comfort.

He kept waiting for what felt like an eternity, in the dimming light of the lantern, which would soon run out of fuel, until he recognized the rhythmic thud of Kaz’s cane on the stone floor. Four silhouettes appeared from the tunnel. He recognized Inej in the grey imp mask, Nina under the lost bride’s veil, and Kaz wearing a guard's uniform. Someone else was with them; tall, broad-shouldered, with the orange cape of the Madman, and Jesper knew somehow this wasn't Muzzen. They had succeeded and freed Matthias Helvar. Jesper noticed that the Fjerdan’s tall frame was slightly hunched, like someone injured and in pain.

“You were early,” Kaz told Jesper in lieu of greeting, as he nudged Matthias towards the boat.

“I was on time,” Jesper protested, feathers ruffled.

“For you, that's early. Next time you plan to impress me, give me some warnings.”

Jesper snorted and holstered his guns to grab the oars. “The animals are out, and I found you a boat. This is when a ‘thank you’ would be in order.”

“Thank you Jesper,” Nina said, her voice thin and labored, just like someone with a sore throat.

“You’re very welcome, gorgeous. See, Kaz? That’s how civilised folk do.”

“If I needed lessons on etiquette, I’d ask your merchling.” Kaz countered, hitting where it hurt. It succeeded in shutting Jesper up. “Now, let’s get out of here before someone notices us.”

Matthias tripped, or launched himself sideways, toward Inej, who sidestepped the attempt swiftly. He almost fell into the water as he did.

“Clumsy this one,” Inej commented flatly.

Kaz grabbed the fjerdan’s arm and forced him to get into the rowboat, then turned toward Nina. “Put him under, Nina,” he ordered.

“Don’t–” Matthias protested, his northern accent thick and guttural. He held up his hands so Nina couldn't approach him.

“You’re dumb enough to capsize the boat,” Kaz retorted.

“Stay away from me, witch,” Matthias hissed in fear and disgust. But Nina didn't need to touch him to use her powers. She joined her fingers and twisted them in the air with a flourish. “Kill you,” Matthias mumbled, but already, his tall frame was crumpling to the bottom of the boat.

“Sleep well,” Nina whispered.

Inej unmoored the boat and when everyone was on board, Jesper maneuvered it out of the tunnel and onto the open sea.

The trip back to Ketterdam was made in utter silence. All the way to Fourth Harbor, Jesper thought of the pure anger in Matthias' voice: love curdled into hatred. He wondered for a second if this was the kind of greeting he’d get from Wylan when he’d next see him. It was hard to imagine, yet still in the realm of possibilities. Wylan, afterall, was under the impression Jesper had berated him, only to go indulge in sex with a brothel boy the very same night.

In the early morning, just as the sun was starting to rise, Jesper and Nina sat across one another at a table in the otherwise empty Crow Club. Matthias was tied to a chair and locked up inside one of the storage rooms of the club’s basement. Kaz had deemed him too unstable to be allowed to roam free just yet.

Jesper poured whisky in a glass and pushed it towards Nina. Maybe it was a little early to drink, but neither of them cared.

Nina gulped the entire content of her glass in one go. It made a hard thud when she put it down on the table. “I don't know if he'll ever forgive me,” she said, voice still rough.

Jesper stared at the amber liquid in his own glass, unsure what sort of reassurance he could offer. “All we can hope for is that love truly conquers all…”

She chuckled without humor. “I've never pegged you for a romantic.”

“Me neither, honestly.” And yet, just as he said those words, Jesper conjured the image of two lions playing and napping in the shade of a torn bush, out in the zemeni outback. As a child, he had thought this was what love looked like. Perhaps he still did. He sighed deeply, before admitting : “I do think Matthias can forgive you, in time, but the thing is I'm not sure if Wylan should forgive me.”

Nina reached out and covered Jesper’s hand with her own, gently pressing her fore and middle finger to the pulse point inside his wrist. A wave of soothing warmth spreaded in his veins. “You still have to try, Jes,” she said, “or else, nothing makes sense.”

Jesper went to bed afterward. He got two good hours of sleep, and at eight bells, he was already walking into Kaz's office with a cup of strong, black coffee in hand.

He put it down on the desk, right in front of his boss.

Kaz, who clearly hadn't gotten a wink of sleep, raised an eyebrow at Jesper's apparent selfless gesture.

“I have to find Wylan,” Jesper declared, propping his hands on his hips, standing tall. He was already wearing his overcoat, ready to go out.

Kaz took a long gulp of coffee first. “I’ll help you,” he then declared.

“Yeah, because you want to use him as collateral,” Jesper pointed out, tone serious and incisive. “But if I find him, and he doesn't want to come back, I won't force him… I’ve no intention of manipulating him for your sake.”

“Of course you don't,” was Kaz’s simple answer. It wasn't confirmation or denial of anything, nor reassurance.

Jesper decided he was going to worry about it later. For now, the priority was finding Wylan, and Kaz was always a valuable asset in that sort of quests. “Where do we begin?”

“We follow the money. Well, I've already done that, actually,” Kaz informed him. He took another leisurely sip of coffee, keeping Jesper in suspense. “I know he cashed the check from our last job ; took 50 000 kruge out, and placed the rest in a bank account under the name Cletus Phrebeny.”

“The name on his fake passeport,” Jesper whispered. “How did you get the info?”

“I bribed the right people.”

“Fifty thousand quids is still an enormous chunk of money,” Jesper observed. “What was he planning on doing with it?”

Kaz put his cup down and grabbed his cane. “That's what we're going to find out.” He stood, walked around his desk and went to the hooks by the door where he took his hat and coat.

“He could have done a number of things with that kind of money : gone away anywhere in Kerch, or even left the country,” Jesper reflected aloud. “It's like looking for a needle in a haystack.”

“Human behavior obeys to patterns, Jesper, but morally good people are the most predictable,” Kaz said. He went back to his desk, pulled a folded piece of paper from one of the drawers and handed it to Jesper as he walked by him.

Jesper unfolded it and realized it was the poster announcing Dhòmhnaill's arrest and calling for information on Rory and the others. “Wh–” he started to ask, puzzled, but Kaz was already stepping out of the room.

“Come on! Let's go pay a little visit to your kaelish tailor,” Kaz hailed Jesper from the hallway.

“He's in jail!” Jesper protested, but Kaz’s footsteps were already receding in the direction of the staircase.

Jesper folded the poster again, slipped it into his coat's inner pocket, and ran after Kaz.

***

“What in Ghezen’s name…”

Frankly, Jesper had expected the front of Dhòmhnaill’s tailor shop to be exactly the same as he had seen it upon his and Wylan’s last visit; window shutters closed, door placarded, stadwatch posters pinned everywhere. But everything, from the recently cleaned display window, to the glow of gas lamps inside, to the very obvious “open” sign, seemed to indicate that the shop was up and running.

The bell rang as Kaz opened the door. He held it to allow Jesper in first.

The most baffling thing of all was to see Dhòmhnaill standing behind the counter, with his bushy, ginger beard intact and his usual, jovial air. “Madainn mhath, Jesper!” Dhòmhnaill greeted him in kaelish. “Good morning to you too, Mr Brekker,” he added upon seeing Kaz trail behind Jesper. “Something tells me you gentlemen aren't here for my promotion on pocket squares,” he surmised.

“I'm happy to see you back in business, old friend,” Jesper rejoiced with sincerity, before he laid out the matter at hand, “but may I ask how this is possible? How did you get out of jail?”

“Someone posted bail for me,” Dhòmhnaill provided right away. “They even hired an attorney to defend me; a very good one – one of those who have an office in the financial district.”

Jesper and Kaz exchanged a glance.

“Who paid for it?” Kaz asked.

“An anonymous benefactor. They set up a fund for the defense of kaelish people arrested under the no-gathering law.”

Kaz approached the counter, leaning against it to take some of the weight off his leg. “Who's managing that fund?” he pressed the tailor.

Dhòmhnaill smoothed his thick beard. “A guy named Visser. Never met him, but he's the one who's been paying my legal fees. He swears it’s not his money, and that he only acts on the benefactor’s behalf.”

Frowning, Jesper turned towards his boss. “Visser? Arken Visser?”

Kaz shook his head. “No. I'm sure that one's dead; the Darkling wouldn't have kept him alive. Besides, Visser is a common surname. There's at least two hundred people in Ketterdam sharing the patronym.” He turned to the tailor again. “Do you know his first name?”

Dhòmhnaill shook his head. “I've never even met him in person. We only corresponded via letters.”

“Needle in a haystack”, Jesper thought again. How many other Vissers did he know himself? There was Ansel Visser, the shoe shiner who always set shop across from the Menagerie. He doubted he was the kind of man to manage funds and hire attorneys. He wasn't even that good at shining shoes. But then, it struck him. “Wait! Jeroen Visser!” he exclaimed. “The barman at Club Cumulus! He used to work with Wylan!”

“Good man, Jes,” Kaz congratulated him with a crooked smile, patting Jesper's chest with a gloved hand, already on his way to the door.

Jesper couldn't help but smile at that. He tipped his hat, wished Dhòmhnaill a good day, and followed Kaz out. If he hadn't been so worried for Wylan, and desperate to see him again, Jesper would've truly enjoyed this ; that little bit of sleuthing with Kaz.

They strode together, down the commercial street towards the Lid. The day was cold, but sunny for a change; the air crisp and as clean as it could be in this part of the city. Jesper felt a surge of hope, and he crossed his fingers that it wasn't misplaced.

“You're thinking the same thing I do, right?” Jesper asked Kaz after a while. “That anonymous benefactor: it's Wylan, isn't it?”

Kaz's face was closed and pensive. “Yes.”

Jesper didn't doubt that Wylan felt guilty for the Kaelish people arrested after the céilí. They’d been held responsible for the destruction of the brewery wall in Wylan's place. He likely felt some personal responsibility, too, if only by association, for those suffering under the no-gathering law his own father had enacted. And yet, Wylan could have chosen to do nothing. Instead, he had used his newfound fortune to do the most virtuous and decent thing possible under the circumstances. Jesper’s heart clenched at the thought. “He’s better than all of us put together, isn’t he?” he said aloud.

Kaz failed to offer any answer.

***

It was almost ten bells when they reached the front door of Club Cumulus.

“It’s closed,” Jesper said matter-of-factly, though with a hint of trepidation. He hadn’t set foot here since that fateful night when his gaze had met a young man wearing a Grey Imp mask. It seemed almost absurd now that he and Wylan had once been complete strangers. Yet, despite everything they had been through together, there was still a shroud of mystery surrounding Wylan Van Eck—one Jesper hoped he’d have the chance to gently peel away like one undresses a lover.

“Doesn't mean no one's in,” Kaz countered. He used the bottom of his cane to knock on the door. Nothing happened for a minute or so. He knocked again, with more insistence, once again to no effect. He had just reached into his coat for his lockpicking kit, when Jesper put a hand over his sleeve to stop him. There were footsteps inside.

“I think someone's coming.”

Kaz knocked again, just in case.

“We're closed, bloody hell,” a muffled, irritated voice said from the other side. The lock was still disengaged and the door open. A stucky, bald man appeared.

“Fahey,” Jeroen said upon seeing Jesper, his eyebrows furrowing into a frown. He didn’t look surprised, but he was no less wary of seeing them there. “Brekker,” he groaned in acknowledgment.

Jesper removed his hat. “We’d like to discuss a private matter, if you’ve got a few minutes to spare,” he said, offering the most charming smile he could muster.

“What’s it about?”

“It’s about Wylan,” Jesper replied. “Please, Visser. We won’t take long.”

Jeroen sighed in surrender and stepped aside to let them in. “You’ve got five minutes. I still have to take stock of the port wine delivery.”

They followed Jeroen to the bar. He stepped behind it, grabbed a rag, and wiped the already clean surface.

“I must say, I’m surprised you’re still working here,” Kaz remarked without preamble. “I’ve heard you recently came into quite a bit of money.”

“I like my job, and I don’t know what else I’d be doing. Is that a crime?” Jeroen responded defensively.

“If it is, I can hardly judge anyone who operates outside the law,” Kaz pointed out with a smirk. “You’ve found yourself a new occupation lately, though—besides bartending. I hear you’ve been paying to get Kaelish people out of jail.” He drummed his gloved fingers on the edge of the bar.

Jeroen's own hand tensed around the rag. “What if I did? What about it?”

“Where did the money come from?”

“It's Wylan, isn't it?” Jesper jumped in. “He's the one funding the release and defense of the kaelish prisoners.”

Jeroen glanced from one man to the other, eyes narrowed. “Why are you asking the question if you already know the answer?”

“Because we need to know where he is,” Jesper said in earnest. He wasn't ready to accept a scenario in which he'd be walking out of the Cumulus having learned nothing useful, and having nowhere else to look.

“Is Wylan in trouble?” Jeroen wanted to know, putting his rag down.

“That's exactly what I'm trying to find out, and why I need your help.”

Jesper’s plea seemed to have had its effect, because Jeroen cleared his throat and said: “He only gave me his instructions, the money, and then, I expect he skipped town.”

“Did he say where he was going?”

“Not… precisely.”

The hesitation made a spark of hope ignite in Jesper’s chest. “He told you something, though, didn't he? What was it?”

Jeroen opened his mouth, but then, his eyes darted to Kaz. He closed it and gritted his teeth. “That’s Wylan’s private life. I'm sorry for being suspicious, but you’re still gangsters, both of you. I know you’re not a bad man, Fahey, but if Wylan wanted you to know where he was going, I reckon he would have told you himself.”

Jesper had never been the most lucky at the card tables; he did not always make the safest decisions, but right now, he knew he couldn't withdraw. He had to go all in and put his cards on the table. Failure was absolutely not an option.

He put his hat down on the bar and positioned himself so Jeroen would have no choice but look him in the eye. “Listen,” he began, voice deep and serious. “I'm Wylan’s boyfriend, and as long as he doesn't sack me from that position, I remain so.” Jeroen's love for his own wife was notorious : not one without the other ; until death do us part. If Jesper wanted to appeal to the man's sensibilities, this was the route he had to take. “I love Wylan,” Jesper declared, no less sincere and his voice cracking slightly. He could feel Kaz's stare burn the side of his face. It was the first time he said those words aloud. He wish Wylan was there to hear them. “I have to find him : I just have to make sure he’s fine. If he doesn't want to come back to Ketterdam, I will take it with grace, but he has to know. He has to know I care.”

Jeroen stared back in silence for a moment that seemed to stretch forever. “Fine. I’ll tell you what I know, but Brekker has to leave,” he declared, pointing at the gang leader.

No protest came. “Very well,” Kaz said. “I'll wait for you outside,” he then informed Jesper, before limping through the gambling hall and out the front door.

Once he was sure Kaz was out of earshot, Jeroen turned toward Jesper again. “Wylan didn't tell me precisely where he was going, but he told my wife that he wished to be closer to his mother. I hope that helps.”

“I think it does,” Jesper breathed. Wylan’s mom was dead, but there was at least one handy thing about deceased people: they didn't tend to move around much. Jesper conjured a memory of the conversation he had had with Wylan as they dug a grave together in the fortress’ moat. Wylan had told him how he had never gotten the chance to visit his mom's grave at….Saint-Hilde Cemetery. That was it!

A sudden burst of energy, like a gunpowder explosion, coursed through Jesper's limbs. “Thank you! Thank you so much, Visser!” he exclaimed. “I swear, I could kiss you right now!”

“I'm happily married,” Jeroen replied with a hint of a smile. “Save that for Wylan.”

They bid each other good day and Jesper found Kaz waiting on the sidewalk outside.

“So?” Kaz inquired.

“I'm pretty sure I know where Wylan is! Visser said that–”

Kaz lifted a hand, interrupting him. “No. Don't tell me. I don't need to know.”

Jesper stayed dumbfounded for a second. “You don't?”

“No I don't,” Kaz repeated. “This is me giving you the chance to rekindle things with Wylan on your own terms, without my own ambitions looming over the two of you.”

That answer startled Jesper so much that he actually stepped back, almost tripping down from the sidewalk as he did. “Who are you? Where's Kaz Brekker and what did you do with him?”

Kaz snorted. “Go get your merchling before I change my mind. I've proven methods to extract information out of someone.”

Jesper grinned. “Ah! There he is!”

***

As he entered a second class compartment, Jesper wondered when the last time was that he had actually bought a train ticket instead of hitching an illegal ride on a freight car. It must have been back when he was still at university, in a less complicated, yet less exciting existence.

He sat down next to a man with an impressively curled mustache, who was reading the Ketterdam Gazette as if it was the most riveting gothic novel. The train jolted, the whistle screeched, and the gears got into motion. The train ride to Saint-Hilde was going to take two hours and a half.

Since Jesper had gone from the Cumulus straight to the train station, without stopping by the Slat to pack anything, he hadn't brought anything that could be used as a means of entertainment. He was reduced to staring out the window, leg bouncing in restlessness.

It had been weeks since Jesper had seen Wylan, and instead of butterflies, a swarm of frantic, iron-winged moths now fluttered in his stomach, their metaphorical wings making thousands of small paper cuts inside him. He still dreamed of a reunion where they’d rush into each other’s arms, and everything would be forgiven, but he feared that was too much to ask. Worse, there was still the chance that Wylan hadn’t stuck around Saint-Hilde after visiting his mother’s grave. Maybe, he was about to follow a trail that had already gone cold.

When the train pulled into Applebroek station, Jesper spotted the tree under which Wylan and he had once sat, waiting for a train that would never arrive. As they rested on the grass, Wylan had shared memories of his mother teaching him to play the piano. Now, the thought of it only brought Jesper pain. When Wylan had felt abandoned and alone, three weeks prior, the one person he had longed for was his deceased mother. In contrast, during times of turmoil, Jesper had had Poppy to turn to for comfort and security. If all else failed, he could always go back to his father in Novyi Zem. It seemed that Wylan had no one. It put into some perspective the idea of Wylan having led a privileged life.

The weather had shifted from sunny and clear to overcast and foggy by the time Jesper stepped off the train. He was the only one to disembark at Saint-Hilde’s station, and the platform felt deserted and eerie. Jesper had never set foot in this village before. It was known mainly for its sprawling cemetery and its sanatorium—two things he had never had any use for. He wandered through the mostly empty streets for a while, trying to get his bearings. There had to be an inn, a tavern, or a public house where he could ask for directions. Instead, his steps led him to the sanatorium—a large, grey-stone building with a facade overgrown with ivy. He couldn’t help but shiver at the sight of the bars covering the windows on all three levels.

A nurse emerged from the main door, hurrying down the stairs to the sidewalk—clearly an employee finishing her shift and eager to get home. Jesper removed his hat and ran a hand through his hair, silently regretting that he had to stop her in her tracks.

"I'm sorry, ma’am," he said.

She turned, eyeing him up and down, squinting. Her hair was disheveled under her nurse’s cap, and her eyes were framed with dark, bluish circles—marks of someone accustomed to long hours and sleepless nights.

“I’m sorry to trouble you,” Jesper continued, “but could you please direct me to the cemetery?”

She continued to squint as she responded: “You’re nearly there, sir.” She pointed to a sign further up the street, one Jesper hadn’t noticed before. He must have looked like an inept city dandy. He couldn't help but wonder if three years in Ketterdam had erased any trace of the farm boy he used to be.

“Do you know who manages it?” Jesper asked before the nurse could move on. “Who looks after the grounds?”
She pursed her lips but answered anyway. “Mistress De Graaf has been the groundskeeper for the last forty years. I reckon she’s the one you should speak to if you need any information.” She gestured in the direction he needed to follow. “She lives in the white house by the gate. Can’t miss it.”

Jesper bowed his head. “Thank you kindly, ma’am.”

She nodded and left.

Jesper knew how much women disliked having to speak to strange men on the street, and frankly, he could not blame them in the slightest.

Jesper walked up the street and followed the signs until he reached his destination.

The cemetery was enclosed by a low, weathered stone wall topped with a wrought-iron fence. As the nurse had said, the small white wooden house by the main gate was hard to miss. It was old, simple, unadorned, yet well-kept. The quaintness of the house contrasted sharply with the sad, grey tombstones and mausoleums on the other side of the gate.

Jesper knocked on the front door, and it wasn't long before it opened to reveal a tall, slender woman in her early sixties, wearing a high-collared brown dress. She lifted her chin to assess Jesper through the spectacles perched low on her nose. She looked more like a schoolmistress than a cemetery groundskeeper, though Jesper hadn't met enough of the latter to judge well.

"Hello, you must be Mrs De Graaf," he said.

She offered him a surprisingly warm smile. "I am. How can I help you, love?"

"I’m looking for someone—"

"Of course," she interrupted, gesturing for him to step inside. "Do you have the death certificate? It would help me if you had the precise date of death, but I can locate someone with just a name, if necessary. Then, I can pull the burial records and the cemetery map for you."

Jesper stood awkwardly in the entryway as she closed the door behind him. "I’m not looking for a deceased person," he corrected her. "The man I’m looking for is very much alive."

"Oh!" She pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose. "Well, that’s unusual."

"I bet it is, given your profession," Jesper said with a nervous chuckle. "I’m looking for a young man who might have visited here in the last three weeks. He’s nineteen, though he might look a little younger. He's about this tall," Jesper said, holding his hand out to indicate a height half a foot shorter than his own. "Curly chestnut hair, hazel eyes, a gentle voice…”

“Ah. You mean Cletus,” Mrs De Graaf said without hesitation.

Jesper’s heart made a loud thud. “Cletus Phrebeny?”

“That’s the one,” she confirmed. “Are you a friend of his?”

“Yes. Of the romantic kind,” he specified, heat rising to his cheeks unexpectedly.

The warm smile from earlier hadn't left Mrs De Graaf’s lips, and if anything, it grew wider. “I see.”

Jesper rubbed his hands together, only now realizing his fingers were cold. “Do you happen to know where he went after he visited here, perchance?”

“He never left, actually.”

Jesper’s heart picked up pace, like a kite soaring into the sky. “Really? He’s here right now?”

“He is. He’s working for me. He offered his help and I hired him to assist my husband with the maintenance around the cemetery,” Mrs De Graaf informed him.

It was almost too good to be true, and Jesper's hands were shaking slightly now. “Do you suppose I could speak to him?”

“I don't see why not. I’ve prepared tea for when he takes his break. I suppose you could go and tell him it's ready? You’re welcome to have tea with us too, if you want, Mister…”

“Fahey. Jesper Fahey. And I’d be happy to.”

Mrs De Graaf showed him a map of the cemetery, tapping her forefinger on an area of mausoleums a few hundred yards north-east of the house. “You’ll find him there. I sent him raking leaves off the pathways earlier.”

His frame taut in anticipation, Jesper exited the house from the back and walked across the cemetery, the damp cobblestones beneath his boots slick with the fog. The autumn air was even cooler as evening approached, and the mist that clung to the ground curled in delicate tendrils between the rows of weathered gravestones.

The wind picked up, chasing only a fraction of the chilly moisture in the air, carrying with it the scent of damp earthiness that lingered in the autumn air. The gray sky hung low, a thick blanket that seemed to press down on the quiet graveyard.

Jesper glanced up at the row of stone mausoleums to his right. They were at least two centuries old, the stone worn and cracked by time, but still imposing—their grand, arching doorways sealed shut, as though even in death, its occupants refused to be disturbed.

He took a turn on a secondary pathway, pushing his hands deeper into his coat pockets. Wet, fallen leaves stuck to his soles, their colors—once vibrant golds and reds—now faded to russets hues. The wind tugged at the remaining leaves on the mostly bare trees, making them rustle like whispers. Here and there, an ancient oak stood, its branches twisting upward like hands reaching toward the heavens.

Jesper’s heart skipped a beat. He stopped, as if on instinct, searching for a figure that might have emerged from the mist. At first, he saw nothing but the skeletal branches and the surrounding monuments, but then, around one of the smaller chapels, a figure stepped into view.

Wylan.

He was wearing a dark coat that blended almost seamlessly into the lichen grey of the tombstones, the collar turned up against the cold. His usually tousled brown hair was tucked neatly beneath a red woolen hat, the soft, wispy ends of it peeking from underneath. He was busy raking the leaves off the path, oblivious to Jesper’s presence, but he was alive and well, pale yet beautiful… However, seeing him there, standing in the cemetery as if he belonged to it, Jesper couldn’t shake the feeling that something had changed.

Jesper was still frozen on the spot, but by some miracle, he managed to utter two words.

“Hello, Sunshine.”

Wylan jumped out of his skin, dropping his rake as if he’d been slapped. He turned around and his eyes, the same tawny color as the oak leaves, widened in shock. “Jesper,” he gasped. The initial surprise vanished and his expression morphed into something else. Jesper had hoped for joy, or relief, and had dreaded to see anger or resentment. He had not quite expected this, somehow. He had not expected fear, and yet, that's what it was.

Wylan looked scared.

Chapter Text

"Jesper."

The name tumbled from Wylan's lips and fell into the soft leaf mulch beneath him, along with the rake that had slipped from his hands. For a moment, he wondered if the mist was playing tricks on his eyes, if his mind was conjuring some impossible illusion. But no—Jesper was truly there. He stood, as solid and real as ever, wrapped in a fancy overcoat, the tip of his nose bright with cold. He looked just as startled as Wylan felt.

Wylan had imagined this moment countless times, and had anticipated it with a mixture of dread and longing. As expected, his heart pounded painfully in his chest, each beat stumbling over the next. "Jesper, Jesper," it pulsed, like a chant. But then it shifted into something darker, colder: danger. Wylan’s face drained of color, and a chill washed over him.

Jesper being here wasn’t a good sign. Not at all.

With a swift, jerky motion, Wylan grabbed the rake from the ground, his fingers curling tightly around the handle. He held it with both hands, knuckles white. "What are you doing here?!" he demanded, his words spilling out fast, urgent. "How did you find me?! Does he know I’m here?!"

Jesper took a cautious step forward, brows furrowed in confusion. "What? Sorry?"

Wylan backed up a step without thinking. "Does he know I’m here?!" he repeated, his voice trembling with a rising panic, the rake now an instinctual shield.

Jesper stopped. "Who?" he asked, his tone even but threaded with something Wylan couldn’t quite read.

“My father!” Wylan all but cried out. His chest was so constricted, the words came out in a croak.

“No! I don't think so! Why?”

“What about Kaz!? If you’re here, that means Kaz knows I’m here, and Kaz works for my father now, and you’re working for Kaz!”

Jesper seemed to be fighting the urge to step forward again – to close the distance between them – to reach for Wylan. “Kaz doesn't know you're here,” Jesper assured him.

Wylan’s grip on the rake loosened somewhat, although he remained on high alert and the pulsing of fear in his throat was still very much there. “What are you doing here, then?”

“What do you mean?” Jesper said, as if he had no idea why Wylan felt the need to ask.

“Why did you come here?” Wylan rephrased sharply.

“Well… for you, of course. I wanted to find you.”

“Why?” Wylan couldn't contain the wariness in his voice.

This time, Jesper gave in and moved forward. “Because you're my boyfriend, damn it! I needed to know that you were alright!” He stopped three steps shy of Wylan, his hands flexing nervously at his sides.

Wylan stiffened, heart sinking, head swimming. “No, I'm not your boyfriend.” He swallowed back the tears threatening to well up. He had stewed in this helpless hurt for weeks now. How else was he supposed to react? “I'm not your boyfriend,” he repeated, hands getting cold with inaction around the handle of the rake, “and you made it abundantly clear when you said that you weren't even sure you could call me your friend!”

Rubbing his face with both hands, Jesper emitted a strangled noise from the back of his throat. “Wy…” he said, the nickname sounding like a plea.

“You can't call me that either! You told me I couldn't call you ‘Jes’ anymore, so I don't think you can use that nickname for me!” It wasn't even anger that made him say it. It was just….practice in misery. He had been repeating this in his own head everytime he caught himself thinking of Jesper ; longing for him. “You've hurt Jesper. You lied to him. He doesn't want you anymore. The trust between you is broken : he told you himself. It's over.”He couldn't let Jesper just stand there and pretend everything was fine. Nothing was fine. Everything had been horrible for weeks now.

Yet, it was Jesper who appeared broken and weary, as if he hadn't slept properly in ages. His fingers trembled so badly that Wylan almost wished he could hold them still.

“Wylan, please hear me out,” Jesper said, his voice heavy with emotion. “I was angry at you for not trusting me enough to be upfront about who you were! It made me doubt what we had between us, and I wondered if you had hidden more than just your name! But more than that, I was furious with Kaz for using me; using us! And I was angry at Inej for enabling him!” The words were coming out of him like a torrent, hasty and unrestrained. Jesper was like this when emotions seized him, and Wylan had no choice but to let it bleed out all over him.

“Saints, Wylan! I felt betrayed on all sides,” Jesper went on, begging to be heard and understood. “Perhaps my anger was justified to some extent, but that doesn’t excuse the way I spoke to you! I dismissed you before you even had a chance to explain! I was cruel and unfair, and for that, I am truly sorry!” He wrung his hands, his eyes brimming with unshed tears that mirrored Wylan’s own. “I handled all of this pretty badly. I don’t expect your forgiveness, but I need you to know how sorry I am. And I wanted to tell you this in person. That's the only reason I'm here. You've got nothing to fear from me beyond that.”

A short inch of tension released from Wylan's shoulders’. He took a deep breath and, without saying a word, walked to the nearest mausoleum and leaned the leaf rake against the wall. The lump in his throat was a mass of sadness and pain that made it hard to breathe. He stood motionless for a few moments, staring at a crack in the stone where a green-winged beetle had hidden, either to hibernate or die. Wylan tried to swallow his tears, but they spilled down his cheeks as he turned to face Jesper.

“You abandoned me. You left, and you never came back,” his voice trembled. “Instead, you went to a brothel, just to hurt me more. And it worked! Trust me, it worked wonders!”

Jesper’s face paled further. “I messed up that night, I know,” he admitted quickly, doing his best to hold Wylan’s gaze. His words came out in a rush again, as if he was weaving a rope with them so he’d have something to hold on to. “I lost control, and I ended up at the Honey Pot, the gambling club beneath the Sweet Shop. I lost a fortune at the tables and got horribly drunk, but I didn’t... I didn’t buy sex. I didn’t sleep with anyone that night. Or any other night since.”

Wylan studied his face, searching for any hint of dishonesty. He found none. “Is that true?”

Jesper nodded. “Yes. You have my word. I would never do that to you, Wylan. Please, you have to believe me.”
“But Kaz...” Wylan trailed off, his doubts lingering.

“Kaz found me that night at the Honey Pot. He tried to talk some sense into me, but I was too drunk and angry to listen. I should’ve come home to you, and I didn’t. I’m an idiot, a hypocrite and I’m sorry.” He took a long, ragged breath, rubbing his eyes in a futile attempt to dry the tears gathering there. “I messed everything up. I regret it so much, you have no idea.” He shook his head, slowly, avoiding Wylan’s gaze. “I’ve missed you every second of every day since, and it’s been tearing me apart, Wy.”

Wylan, too, had been miserable, and the tears that traced his cheeks followed the same path many others had, over the past few weeks. But hearing that Jesper hadn’t betrayed him with someone else, that he was sorry, that he wanted to make things right—it eased some of the weight on Wylan’s heart, lightened the knot in his stomach. It didn’t fix everything, far from it, but it was a start.

He looked at Jesper’s disheveled appearance despite the expensive clothes—his blood-shot eyes, the dark bags beneath them, the tense muscles of his jaw and the deep creases on his forehead. “You look exhausted,” Wylan said softly.

“I am,” Jesper admitted, shoulders dropping.

With a sigh, Wylan pointed a finger past the row of mausoleum and the oak trees ahead. “There's a bench a little further up the pathway. Do you want to sit down?”

“Yes, please.”

For the always restless and ever moving Jesper to readily accept to stay immobile for a while, the ordeal must have taken a real toll on him.

Wylan guided Jesper further along the pathway he had cleared of leaves, to a granite bench marked with a date some thirty years distant, and the mention “dedicated to the loving memory of Greta and Eline Brechtje”. The sun was setting already, but it failed to offer any interesting spectacle since the clouds and the fog were masking it. The muted colors of their surroundings were just putting on darker shades.

Jesper sat heavily on the cold, solid granite. Wylan stayed upright, gnawing at the side of his thumb. He didn't even really notice he had started pacing back and forth in front of the bench before Jesper spoke up. “I might be exhausted, but you're clearly a bundle of nerves. For a moment there, I was sure you were going to attack me with that rake.” He gave a rueful chuckle.

Wylan pulled on a hangnail with his teeth without looking at Jesper. “How did you find out where I was?” This question had been eating him alive ever since Jesper appeared in the fog.

“I found you because of this very generous thing you did for the people arrested at the céilí,” Jesper revealed, with an admirative note to his tone.

Unaffected by the praise, Wylan continued pacing, his gaze on the cobblestones and the tips of his boots. This is exactly what he had been fearing.

On his request, Jesper gave a succinct account of how, with Kaz’s help, he had followed the money trail left by Wylan’s legal initiative, and how it had led them from Domnhaill’s tailor shop to the Cumulus. By the time Jesper finished his tale, Wylan had removed his wool hat and was twisting it in his hands. If Kaz and Jesper had been able to track him down, he had no doubt his father's men could do the same. No matter the effort he had put onto covering his tracks, it hadn't been enough. He had strived to do the right thing for the kaelish people; repair a fraction of the damage his father had done to that community, and perhaps, this was precisely what was going to get him killed in the end. If curiosity could kill the cat, generosity might be a close second.

Maybe, the reason why he hadn't done a better job at disappearing, however, was because part of him held out hope that Jesper would find him at some point. Now Jesper was here, and Wylan was in danger again.

When Wylan’s fretful pacing brought him in front of the bench again, Jesper caught his sleeve – a light grip Wylan could easily shake off if he wanted. It still brought him to a halt. Their eyes locked.

“What's going on? What are you scared of?” Jesper asked, low but insistant. “I need to know the truth. It's your father, isn't it? He's the one you're scared of. What did he do, Wylan? I think I'll hate the answer, but I need to know.”

Jesper's hand moved down Wylan's sleeve and found the skin of his wrist underneath, fingers circling it carefully, as if picking up an injured bird.

Wylan shivered. “Do you know why I came here in the first place? To that cemetery?” he asked under his breath.

“You were looking for your mom's grave.”

“Yes, but…I think I was also looking for answers.”

“Answers about what?”

“About how she died. I think he killed her, or ordered her death. But in any case, he made her disappear. My mom wasn't ill. My father just got rid of her.”

Jesper’s eyebrows shot up, then instantly knitted down in a hard frown. His grip on Wylan's wrist strengthened, fingertips digging lightly into his pulse point. “How– What makes you think that?”

With a hard gulp, Wylan steeled himself. “Because he tried to do the same to me ….”

This time, Jesper released his arm as if he’d touched a hot stove. The muscles of his face went slack and he blanched visibly. This gave his usual, golden-brown complexion a grey tinge Wylan didn't like. Slowly, he rose to his feet. “I beg your pardon?”

“He tried to have me killed,” Wylan confirmed, his voice sounding foreign and distant to his own ears.

Jesper was just staring, frozen in place, so Wylan went on. It was too late to backtrack now. The ugliness, the wretchedness of it ; it had to be dragged from its grave and brought out in the open to be examined and to rot in plain sight. “He hired two thugs to do it. I think they were former Black Tips, but I can't be sure. They tried to get rid of me on the boat to Belendt, where my father was supposedly sending me to music school, but I managed to jump overboard. I swam into the canal, and ran for my life. That's how I ended up in the Barrel, working at the tannery, then, at the Cumulus. Kaz recruited me, and–”

“Your throat,” Jesper croaked, putting a hand over the base of his neck. “They tried to strangle you…”

For a split moment, Wylan wondered how he could possibly know that, but only then did he realize Jesper was just mimicking his own gesture. Wylan had been massaging his throat subconsciously at the memory of that awful night.

"They tried to strangle you," Jesper repeated, his voice stiff with shock. He was no doubt remembering that afternoon on the Volkvony, when a simple touch to Wylan's throat had triggered a panic attack instead of the reaction Jesper had intended. His eyes darkened to an inky blackness Wylan had never seen before. "The fuckers tried to strangle you…,” he repeated, voice low but laden with such cold rage that Wylan instinctively took a step back. “The horrible, miserable fucking swines!"

Confronted with anger, Wylan's first reflexes were always to either freeze, flee, or apologize. “I’m sorry,” he heard himself say.

“Don’t!” Jesper snapped.

Before Wylan could do anything, he was pulled into a savage embrace.
At first, Wylan stiffened, caught in Jesper's strong grip, but then the familiar feeling of those long, lean arms around him—the scent of gunpowder and jurda, the warmth that seemed to seep into his very soul: it was everything he had been yearning for. He hadn’t dared to hope for it, even though he had craved that closeness desperately. He clenched his fists into the fabric of Jesper's dark overcoat, pulling him in with just as much fierce need, allowing himself the vulnerability of burying his face in Jesper's neck.

Jesper was shaking. “…..Oh…..Wy….this is….I'm so sorry….I'm so sorry this happened to you….”

They held each other, trembling together in the midst of an overwhelming surge of conflicting emotions, clinging to one another. Time seemed to stretch on, and only the silent gravestones bore witness to the moment.
When they finally pulled apart slightly, their arms aching from the prolonged embrace, Jesper cupped Wylan's face in his hands, gently tilting his head to meet his eyes. "You should have told me. Why didn’t you tell me?"

Wylan shook his head. “I couldn't. It was too hard; too scary. I’m sorry.”

“It's okay, sweetheart. It's not your fault,” Jesper assured him, wiping Wylan’s tears with his thumbs, although his own face was bathed with them too. “None of it is your fault. I’m not angry with you anymore, I promise.” He drew Wylan back against his chest. “You can hold on to me, my darling,” he whispered. Wylan’s arms slipped into his unbuttoned coat and went around his waist. “That's it.”

Jesper rocked him for a little while, side to side, a gentle sway, as he rubbed his back in soothing circles.

It was both painful and amazing just how quickly Wylan relaxed against Jesper’s body and let himself be calmed by his presence; how much he still trusted him, despite everything. He had closed his eyes, concentrating on the feeling of Jesper. His breathing had slowed down to a more bearable level by now, but the very last thing he wanted was to think of what was going to happen next, when he'd have to leave Jesper's arms.

“There's something I don't understand,” Jesper asked, keeping Wylan close. “Why on earth did your father want to get rid of you?”

Wylan gulped, forcing himself to open his eyes and to look up. “It's because I can't read.”

A startled silence, then : “He tried to kill you because you have a hard time reading words?” Jesper enunciated with utter bafflement.

“And writing,” Wylan added. “I'm a faulty heir. At some point, he figured out I'd never be a mercher like him; that I would never be able to take over the family business. I became useless to him. So when Alys, my step-mother, got pregnant, he decided to make space for his new successor.”

Again, rage flashed in Jesper’s eyes, but before he could open his mouth to speak, Wylan placed a firm hand to his chest, interrupting him. “We’ll talk more about this later,” he promised. “I’ll tell you everything you want to know, but right now, Cornelia is waiting, and she’ll wonder what’s taking me so long.”

Jesper blinked, like someone waking up from an uncomfortable dream. “Cornelia ?”

“Mrs De Graaf; my employer.”

“Oh. Yes, I met her. Charming lady. I was supposed to fetch you for tea actually. And yes. We’ll talk more later,” Jesper agreed. He took Wylan’s hands, brought them to his mouth and kissed the knuckles. “I've got things of my own I want to share. Nothing frightening, I swear,” he hastened to add, when he saw the nervous flicker in Wylan's eyes.

Wylan heaved a deep sigh and nodded. “Okay.” They’d soon have to let go of one another. That inevitability felt like the painful pull of a fishing hook stuck between Wylan’s shoulder blades. “Jes?” He tested the nickname carefully, and was relieved to find out it tasted right on his tongue.

“Yes, love?”

“I'm still afraid, but, at the same time, I'm so glad you're here. I've missed you.”

The affectionate warmth was back in the rich, deep tone of Jesper's voice. “Me too. I've missed you so much.”

They went in for a kiss at the same moment. Their mouths met halfway with an uncoordinated bump of cold, wet, runny noses. The kiss was salty from the tears, and a little snotty too. It was far from being perfect, but Wylan didn't care. He kissed Jesper with all he had. He didn't need perfection ; he only needed his Jes, and he had him. He wasn't naive enough to think that everything would be alright from then on, though. This was no fairytale. But he was still determined to cherish that spark of happiness, and to put as much kindling on it as he could to make it into a fire, even if it had to burn only for one night.

Finally, with crushing reluctance, they broke their embrace.

“Let's go,” Wylan breathed, shoving his wool hat into his coat pocket, and prompting Jesper to walk down the pathway with him. “I think it’s time I come clean to Cornelia and tell her who I really am.”

“You don't want me to have to call you ‘Cletus’?” Jesper teased with a smirk.

Wylan winced. “That’s only part of it.”

Mrs De Graaf had been so kind to him, ever since he had arrived in Saint-Hilde. Wylan hadn't liked having to lie to her, just as he had hated lying to Jesper about his identity, but it seemed to be the best, safest course of action at the time. He had been planning on telling her the truth, at some point, but with Jesper here now, the revelation would have to be made sooner than he expected. It wasn't a bad thing in itself. By now, he knew Cornelia to be a discreet, and truly decent woman who would not put his life in danger willingly. Furthemore, to get answers regarding his mother, he would need her help, and that meant he’d have to offer complete honesty. He told Jesper as much, as he went and picked the rake from where he had left it.

“I want to help you get those answers, and uncover the truth,” Jesper said as they resumed their walk. “Any way I can help : I will.”

This assurance wrapped Wylan’s aching heart in soft, warm cotton wool. “What about Kaz? Doesn't he need you back in Ketterdam?”

Jesper’s gaze dropped down to his boots. “He’ll wait.” He kicked a chestnut that went rolling off the pathway and fell down a freshly dug grave hole.

They turned left onto the main path leading towards the white cottage. Jesper gave Wylan a sidelong glance. They were walking so close their sleeves brushed against one another; a whisper of fabric. “Can I hold your hand?”

Wylan felt heat rushing up to his face. “Of course,” he whispered too, almost inaudibly, as if he was scared the dead resting under earth on both sides of the path would disapprove of this blatant display of life. Disregarding their opinion, he laced his fingers with Jesper's. Jesper exhaled through his mouth, with what sounded like relief, and they walked the rest of the way hand in hand.

It was almost completely dark when they reached the cottage's back door. “You have to take your boots and hat off when you come in,” Wylan instructed, leaving the leaf rake on the back porch. “Cornelia is very adamant about those things.”

“Fair enough,” Jesper said as Wylan ushered him in. He shed his hat, coat, and his holsters and revolvers for good measure; left them on the coat rack by the door. Wylan agreed that bringing firearms in someone’s home when invited for tea seemed somewhat impolite.

A cozy fire was roaring in the hearth of the small parlor, casting a flickering glow of light over the wallpaper. It made the intricate pattern of entwined willow branches look like they were rustling in an absent breeze.

Faithful to his daily ritual, Tobias was sitting in his armchair, his feet propped on a footstool, reading the Island Herald. He folded the newspaper in his lap and stood when he caught a glimpse of Wylan and their guest.

Tobias De Graaf was a half-Zemeni man, but, unlike Jesper, his brown skin had the leathery roughness of someone who spent decades working outside in the windy, rainy and cold Kerch weather. He had laughing eyes and had a collection of crow's feet at the corner of them.

“This is Mr De Graaf,” Wylan introduced him to Jesper.

“Pleased to meet you, sir,” Jesper said with a smile, reaching for a handshake.

Tobias accepted the offered hand in silence, shook it with a strong grip, then, his gaze darted to Wylan.

“He's deaf, and non-verbal,” Wylan explained to Jesper. “He can read on lips pretty well, but he mostly uses hand signs.” Then, he turned to Tobias. “This is–” Wylan began introducing his boyfriend using the appropriate signs. He set out to spell Jesper’s name using his fingers. “JE,” he signed, then hesitated, “… oh, wait.” He tried to remember how to do the “s” sound. “S-P-E-R,” he completed. He might have spelled “Jelper” instead, and hoped it wasn't the case.

Tobias slided the palms of his hands flat against one another, brought his forefingers together, and then pointed at Jesper.

“He says he's pleased to meet you too,” Wylan translated.

Jesper was staring at Wylan, eyebrows raised, with an odd expression. “You learned sign language in like… a month?”

Wylan gave a one-shoulder shrug. “Just the basics.”

“You're absolutely brilliant,” Jesper retorted. “You never cease to amaze me.”

Tobias, who had read the praise on Jesper's lips, nodded slowly with an amused crinkle of his eyes.

“It’s really not that hard,” Wylan mumbled, heat blooming on his cheekbones. “I find it a lot easier than reading in fact.”

Tobias gave Wylan a fond pat on the shoulder as he walked past him. Then, as if prompted by some sort of intuition, he went sitting at the table in the middle of the room about ten seconds before Cornelia appeared in the doorframe. She had her round spectacles propped on her head and was carrying a tray with a teapot, four porcelain cups, a sugar pot, a milk ǰug, and a plate with a generous pile of sandwiches.

She beamed at Wylan and Jesper who were still standing by the fireplace together. “I was beginning to wonder if you two lovebirds were going to join us,” she commented. “I almost sent Tobias to check that you hadn't fallen into one of the graves he dug this afternoon.”

Wylan gave a nervous chuckle in reply. “We're sorry we're late. We had some catching up to do.”

“I don’t doubt it,” she said, putting the tray down and waving them closer. “Come. Sit. I've made sandwiches for you and your gentleman caller. I hope you like strawberry jam, Mr Fahey.”

“It’s my favorite, actually,” Jesper said with a charming grin, as he sat down on a chair between Wylan and Tobias, “and please, call me ‘Jesper.’” If Wylan didn't know Cornelia better, he'd swear he’d seen a bit of color appearing on her cheeks just then, as she poured the strong, hot tea in Jesper's cup and offered him milk and sugar. Jesper tended to have that effect on people.

Jesper refused the milk and accepted a sugar cube, and then, he waited until everyone had tea before he cleared his throat and addressed Mrs De Graaf. “ Wy– I mean, Cletus, said that you’ve been very kind and welcoming to him ever since he arrived here, and I wanted to thank you for that.” He squeezed Wylan's knee under the table as a silent apology for almost having let his real name slip.

“There’s no need to thank us,” Cornelia assured him. “It’s our pleasure. He’s been very helpful and valiant,” she added, with a smile at Wylan and a tilt of her head, “although with quite a bit of sorrow in those pretty eyes. I’m very pleased to see that some of it has lifted at last.” She must have observed it in Wylan's face over the past few weeks, heard it in his voice too: the steady hum of pain he had apparently failed to conceal.

Taking a tiny sip of the scalding hot tea, Wylan gathered his courage. “Cornelia. There's something I've been meaning to tell you.”

Mrs de Graaf made a swift gesture of dismissal as she finally sat down and stirred her tea with a silver spoon. “If it’s about the leaves, don't worry. The sun sets so early at this time of year. I don't expect you to be raking after dark.”

He swallowed down. “It’s not about the leaves. It’s …about me.” He took a deep breath. “My name is not Cletus Phrebeny.”

She did not miss a beat, didn't flinch or bat an eyelash. “Of course it's not, sweetie.” The smile never left her face as she said it.

“How…how did you know?” Wylan asked with a pulse of alarm, feeling Jesper's hand tighten around his knee underneath the table.

“I've lived in that cemetery all my life,” Cornelia reminded him, placing jam sandwiches on smaller plates that she passed around. “My father was the last groundskeeper, and my grandmother before him. I know almost every soul that's buried here ; and Cletus Phrebeny died of consumption at age sixteen more than twenty years ago. He’s buried on West row 34, in case you'd like to go and say hello.”

Wylan and Jesper exchanged a quick look.

“‘Phrebeny’ really isn't exactly a common surname to start with,” she went on, “and no offense to the name “Cletus', but I doubt many other parents would've favored such an unfortunate combination. Besides, the criminals who falsify documents use the identities of dead people all the time, and when you showed me your own passport, I instantly knew it was a fake.” She took a long sip of tea with foxy satisfaction at their dumbfounded stares.

“And you hired me anyway?” Wylan couldn't help but ask.

“You seemed nice and we needed the help,” Tobias signed.

Wylan rubbed the back of his neck, unsure how to feel. He hadn't expected the revelation of his deception to be met with such casual, accepting indifference. “I guess now would be the time where I should tell you that my real name is Wylan Van Eck.”

It was Cornelia and Tobias’ turn to exchange a look. She quickly spelled Wylan’s real name in signs for her husband’s benefit, to make sure he had understood. Then, she turned towards Wylan again. “The ‘black laurel’ Van Ecks? Those ones?”

“Yes,” Wylan confirmed with a nod, bracing himself, but he wasn't sure what for.

With a slight frown, Cornelia rubbed her chin. “The Van Ecks’ mausoleums occupy the entirety of South row 4, and their tombs are the biggest monuments we have here; they're hard to miss. It's a very ancient family you have, my boy ; it dates all the way back to the very beginning of the cemetery.”

“I'm looking for my mom's grave, in fact,” Wylan informed her, with a flicker of hope in his chest. “That’s why I came here in the first place.”

Tobias knocked on the table to catch their attention, then looked at Wylan as he signed a question. Wylan recognized the word “mausoleum”, which they often used when they worked together. The other one was the sign for “key”. Wylan interpreted it as meaning : “Do you have the key for the mausoleum?”

“No, I don't. I don't even know which of the monuments she's buried in. I've never seen her grave. I was eight when she died and my father didn't let me come to the funeral.”

Cornelia gasped. “That's so cruel! Attending the funeral and being able to see a loved-one’s final resting place is such an important and essential part of the grieving process! Your father should never have deprived you of this. Did he let you see the body, at least? Say goodbye?

“No, he didn't.”

She signed a few sentences for her husband in swift, outraged motions. Tobias replied with a few of his own. Jesper’s eyes were traveling between the two as he ate his jam sandwich, fascinated.

“He agrees with me that it's revolting,” Mrs De Graaf finally translated. “And you were so young! Oh…darling. I'm so sorry. Sometimes adults think they know better, and they want to spare their children from the reality of death. But they're not helping them in the long run.”

Wylan took a small bite of his own sandwich not to have to comment on her assumption. He doubted his father had “spared” him out of the goodness of his heart, or for fear of inflicting trauma upon his son. He had probably never cared enough about Wylan for that. In any case, Cornelia was right. Wylan would have preferred being allowed to say his final farewell to his mother, even as a lifeless body, than being left with this bitter, unresolved grief years later.

“So you came here because you wanted to see her?” Cornelia prompted Wylan softly.

“Yes. I still do.”

“I've the keys to all of the mausoleums, even the oldest ones, so it shouldn't be a problem. If you were eight years old when she passed away…and Mr Fahey here said you are nineteen now, that means she died eleven years ago. Did I get that right?”

“Yes,” Wylan confirmed.

She stood from her chair and took the spectacles down from her head, placing them on the bridge of her nose. “Let me pull the records out for that year,” she decided, smoothing the skirt of her maroon dress. “In the meantime, you two should eat and drink your tea while it’s still hot.” She turned on her heels and left the room right away, a spring of determination in her step.

Wylan forced himself to take three more bites of sandwich, and to drink the content of his cup.

Jesper had eaten two jam sandwiches already, and he was reaching for a third by the time Cornelia came back with a black leather-bound book under her arm. She cleared the table from the tea tray and from her own cup that she had barely touched. “Okay. Let me see,” she said, opening the register on the table. She licked her finger and went through the pages. Tobias leant sideways to look.

Mrs De Graaf adjusted her glasses with a frown that just kept on deepening as seconds passed and she went back and forth between the register's pages.

“Is something the matter?” Wylan asked, unable to conceal the tension in his voice.

She did not answer right away, her finger skimming over a column of names right down to the bottom of the page. “Hm. It seems I've no Van Eck deaths listed for that year,” she finally said. “But your mother might have been recorded under another name. What was her maiden name?”

“Hendriks,” Wylan supplied.

She went a dozen pages back. Her eyes traveled over the columns with growing concern. “I've three people with the surname Hendriks. Two of them are male. The third is Jacoba Hendriks, but… that can't be your mom. That woman was eighty-nine when she died. Perhaps I've got the date wrong.” She closed the register to look at the numbers embossed on the leather cover.

“No… that's the right year,” Wylan confirmed. It was a lot easier for him to read numbers than letters, and this was definitely the year his mother passed away.

Cornelia went over the relevant pages of the register again for good measure, and when she lifted her eyes again, her slim eyebrows were so furrowed they were almost touching. She pushed her spectacles up her nose. “This is strange….very strange.” She looked more troubled than Wylan had ever seen her. She prided herself with the quality of her bookkeeping and her excellent memory. This had to be a blow.

“You said you knew everyone who’s buried here,” Jesper pointed out without reproach. “Do you remember the Van Ecks hosting a funeral here at the time?”

“The posh people : they have their own undertakers, so we didn't provide the coffin and the arrangements, that's the thing,” she explained, and turned to her husband. They exchanged a rapid series of signs that Wylan was too unsettled to try and follow. If his mother wasn't listed in the register at all; what did that mean?

“Our son was doing the bookkeeping for the cemetery at the time,” Cornelia added. “I wanted to train him to take my place one day. He ended up choosing another career path, but he's as meticulous as I am, though.” She looked at Wylan with a sharp set to her mouth. “If your mother was buried here, during that year, she should be in that book without a doubt. Let's check again. What was your mom's given name?”

Wylan's mouth was strangely dry. “Marya. Marya Hendriks.”

Cornelia opened the register to the first page again, and went through it column by column, chewing on the inside of her cheek in concentration.

Wylan only noticed he had been bunching the tablecloth in his fist when Jesper put a gentle hand over his, and disentangled it from the fabric. Jesper entwined his fingers with Wylan's, encouraging him to squeeze his hand instead of abusing the innocent tablecloth.

The room was utterly silent, except from the scraping of Cornelia’s fingernail over the paper, the crackling of the fire in the hearth, and the sound of Wylan's blood thrumming in his ears. He wasn't quite sure what he was dreading, and yet, the quivering anxiety wouldn't leave him alone. Only the press of Jesper's warm palm against his own managed to keep him grounded.

Suddenly, her finger froze in the middle of a page. She blinked once, twice,
then leveled a strange look at Wylan. “I’ve only got one person named Marya for that year, but she’s listed as Marya MacAndrick, who was born in Ketterdam, and died at age thirty-five.”

Wylan shook his head. “That’s not her.” The age was accurate, as was the place of birth, as far as he knew, but it wasn't her. It could not be her.

“And yet,” Cornelia said carefully, “she’s on South row 4, in one of the Van Ecks’ mausoleums.”

The news dropped like a stone in the middle of the parlor table, and a boulder of the same size rolled down to the pit of Wylan's stomach. At a loss of any other way to react, he shook his head again. “That’s not possible.”

“MacAndrick; that’s a kaelish name,” Jesper observed in a low voice, “just like ‘Wylan’.” He looked almost sorry for even bringing it up.

Wylan was sure he must have gone a few shades paler. At the céilí, Rory had approached him addressing him in kaelish, assuming he was a fellow countryman, because of his first name, and perhaps, even because of something about the way he looked. Was there any credit to this supposed connection after all? Jan Van Eck detested kaelish people with a searing passion, and had always been pretty vocal about it. To him, they were sub-citizens ; a whiny mass of cheap labor who should be grateful he deigned to employ them in the first place.

Tobias knocked on the table to catch Wylan’s attention, which made him jump and grip Jesper’s fingers tighter. He was too on edge to react to things in a measured way.

Tobias pointed at the sugar bowl in the middle of the table, then, held his thumb near his chin, fingers facing up, and tapped his hand against his chin twice. Wylan stared at him, puzzled. Tobias repeated the sign, then pointed at the sugar bowl again.

Wylan glanced at Cornelia, who was standing stiff by the table, and judging by her expression, she too was clueless as to what her husband was trying to convey.

Making his hand into a fist, Wylan rubbed it in a circular motion across his chest, then raised his hand and sprung his forefinger up toward the ceiling, shaking his head : “I’m sorry. I don't understand.”

Tobias stood in one swift move, pushing the chair with the back of his knees. “I’ll be right back,” he signed, and promptly exited the room by the stairs leading to the second floor.

Jesper took the sugar bowl and opened the lid to look inside, as if it held some sort of clue, but only found innocent-looking sugar cubes. “What’s with the sugar?”

“I’m not sure,” Wylan breathed, just as confused. Something was tickling his brain – an inkling as to Tobias’ meaning, but thoughts were spinning so quickly in his head. It didn't allow him to hone in on anything useful.

“Excuse me for one minute,” Cornelia declared, closing the register in an abrupt manner. She put the book under her arm and headed toward the stairs that lead to the basement's archive room. “Please enjoy the tea,” she said, before closing the door behind her.

Wylan and Jesper were left alone in the parlor, not enjoying the tea.

Wylan disengaged his hand from Jesper’s, rested his elbows on the table, and buried his face in his hands. The first pulse of a headache was bouncing in his skull from temple to temple. What did this all mean? His mother's real name missing from the register ; was this just a clerical error, or the sign of something a lot more sordid? He was starting to believe it could only be the latter.

“What are you thinking about?” Jesper softly asked.

“Too many things.”

“Could ‘MacAndrick’ be your maternal grandmother's name do you think?”

“Maybe? I don't know,” Wylan muttered, pressing the heels of his palms into his orbits.

“What do you know of your mom's family?”

“Very little. I was young when she died, and afterward, my father never spoke of her again, as if she had never existed at all.” The fear and grief crystallized into something like anger behind his ribs. “My father is an arsehole who never had consideration for anyone beyond the gain he could make from them. How do you think he got so rich?”

“You're not like that, though,” Jesper observed, perhaps more for himself than Wylan’s sake.

Wylan gritted his teeth. “The fact remains that I have a hard time imagining him willingly marrying someone with blood from the Wandering Isle.” Unless…. Unless there was a lot of money to make from that union.

Lowering his hands from his face, Wylan stared at the sugar bowl with dawning horror, as if the piece of porcelain was going to attack him.

On cue, Tobias was back in the room with a folded newspaper and a thick, green book. He placed the newspaper open to the central page in front of Wylan and Jesper. A piece from the top of the page had been ripped off, but that’s not what Tobias wanted to bring to their attention. He had a graphite pencil in his hand, and, leaning over Jesper's shoulder, he circled an advertisement at the bottom of the page. Wylan recognized the logo : two sugar canes crossed like swords in a duel.

“Hendriks Sugar. Yeah,” Jesper commented with a shrug. “Everyone knows of Hendriks Sugar ; my dad uses it in his tea all the time.” His eyes widened all of a sudden, and he turned his head to stare at Wylan in realization. “Wait a minute… you are Hendriks Sugar, aren't you?” he exclaimed.

“Not me ; my father,” Wylan corrected. “My mom brought the company into the marriage as a dowry, since she was an only child. My father owns it now. He kept the name, though, since it was an established brand already.” At least Wylan knew that much about his family history.

Tobias didn't waste any time, and dropped the green book down on the table, opening it to a page that had been marked with the piece torn from the newspaper.

“What’s that book?” Wylan asked.

“It's the Kerch Business Bureau's postal register from thirty five years ago,” Jesper explained, looking at the page header. Then, he read the address Tobias had hastily underlined with the pencil : “Hendriks Sugar. Gregor and Edna Hendriks, proprietors, 46 Robijnstraat, Geldin District, Ketterdam.”

“That must be my grandparents,” Wylan whispered thinly. He had never even known their first names ; or, maybe, his mom spoke about them long ago and he had forgotten. He felt a strange sort of shame from not even having tried to find out before today.

Jesper turned towards Tobias. “I don't understand the connection between this and the MacAndrick name, though.”

“That's where I come in,” Cornelia announced, walking into the room with two other registers.

Wylan felt his headache getting worse at the sight of more books. He hated the bloody things, and even more so tonight that their content was making his whole sense of self shift on its axis. He wanted to know the truth, sure, but the path to it was unpleasant, to say the least. At least, Jesper was sitting next to him for it.

Mrs De Graaf put both registers on the table, and pressed a hand over the pile. To Wylan’s relief, she did not open them. Instead, she declared: “I’ve found them.” She was slightly out of breath, and had to take a pause before she continued. “Gregor and Edna MacAndrick, both born in the Wandering Isle. Gregor died twenty-one years ago, and his wife passed away two years later. They have a mausoleum on South row 5.”

“They are buried here?” Wylan asked, holding his breath.

“Yes. It took me a bit to understand what Tobias was trying to say when he was pointing at the sugar bowl and repeating the word “mother”, but then I remembered the mausoleum with the crossed sugar canes over the door. I had to make sure I was right before I said anything, though.” She gestured at the newspaper and the Business Bureau book. “It seems that great minds think alike,” she added, and signed something to her husband that made him beam with pride.

“My mother always used the name Hendriks,” Wylan pointed out. “To my knowledge, she never said anything about having another.”

“Immigrants who change their names when they arrive in a new country are commonplace,” Cornelia explained. “This isn't the first example I see, believe me. And I would not be surprised that successful business people like your grandparents decided to adopt a common Kerch name such as ‘Hendriks’ in the hope to be better accepted in the conservative mercher circles of Ketterdam.” She patted the leather of the registers as if it was the flank of a trusted steed. “When they died, however, their death certificates were written based on their birth records, hence the reason why both your grandparents and your mother have been buried under the MacAndrick surname.”

Wylan stared down at the few, stray tea leaves stuck at the bottom of his cup. He wondered if the kaelish blood Marya had passed down to him was another thing his father had held against him, and if this was the reason why he often said his name with disgust, as if the mere sound of it was grating on his nerves.

“I’m half-kaelish,” Wylan said out loud, feeling rather numb and trying to make the words sound real. He looked at Jesper. “I'm half-kaelish...just like you.”

“You are, darling!” Jesper replied with a bright grin. “Isn't it amazing? I can't wait to see you in a kilt! Those calves need a bit of sunlight for sure. ”

Jesper's genuine smile and enthusiastic reaction reminded Wylan that he didn't need to treat this like a death sentence. It could be a good thing. “I don't know anything about being kaelish, though,” he murmured, sheepish.

“It's alright,” Jesper reassured him, squeezing his fingers over the table. “I'll teach you.”

A sensation of warmth filled Wylan’s veins like a strong liquor. It gave him some courage. He cleared his throat and addressed Cornelia. “I'd like to see my mom’s grave, please,” he decided.

“Tonight?”

“If it's not too much trouble.”

“Of course not. I'll go get the key.”

***

Wylan and Jesper were standing together, shoulder to shoulder, in front of an imposing mausoleum on South row no 4. It had started snowing ; the sort of snow that thawed as soon as it touched the ground. It made everything damp and cold.

Jesper lifted the lantern to cast more light on the monument. Its stone façade, once pristine, was now weathered from exposure to the elements. Dark vines crept up its sides like an unwelcome embrace, hinting at nature’s indifference to wealth and grandeur.

“That’s the one?” Jesper asked.

“It appears so,” Wylan replied, closing his fist around the cold metal of the key. They had walked past a row of at least five other mausoleums bearing the same family crest—a wreath of black laurel leaves—carved in fine detail, guarding the large iron door beneath.

Like anything when the Van Ecks were concerned, the mausoleum was not just a burial site but a statement ; a symbol of opulence and power. It reflected the family's stature and their somber devotion to their ancestors, both of which left Wylan stoic. He wasn't there for his forefathers : he was there for Marya, and Marya only.

“You have a duty to your family’s legacy.” That was one of the things Jan Van Eck had desperately tried to instill in his son. Of course, every time he said it, he meant the Van Ecks’ legacy. Always the Van Ecks. And perhaps, this had been the whole point all along – a way to divert Wylan’s attention from his mother's heritage.

Wylan walked up to the door and pushed the key into the hole. The lock resisted, jammed with rust, but Wylan gave a strong push of his shoulder and the door opened.

Jawline set in determination, he stepped into the crypt. Jesper was on his heels, lighting their way with the lantern.

The interior was surprisingly bare and austere. It bore none of the ostentation the outside displayed. The north wall of the mausoleum had eight niches carved into them : deep, square openings into which the casket containing the bodies were placed, head first, then closed with a plaque.

“Martyn Van Eck,” Jesper read on a plaque high up on the wall. “This has to be your grandfather.” He pointed at another plaque on the next niche to the left. “And that must be your grandmother.”

Wylan had never met his grandfather Van Eck, but he remembered with withering vividity Martyn’s stern, judgemental stare on the painted portrait hanging over the grand staircase of the mansion. As a child, Wylan had been constantly unsettled by the way the portraits’ eyes seemed to be following him as he went down the stairs. He still had nightmares about it sometimes.

Marya wasn't difficult to find, since only three of the niches were occupied. Wylan grazed the letters on the plaque with the tip of his fingers. He had expected to feel something. Grief? Relief? Instead, there was just this gaping void in his chest. The tomb gave him the impression of an empty husk. His mother’s body would be the same. Her life, and everything she had been for Wylan was gone. He wasn't going to find it here, or anywhere else.

Jesper lowered the lantern so he could see the plaque better. “Marya M. Van Eck, it reads. ‘M’ as in MacAndrick, I suppose?”

“A small concession to her true parentage,” Wylan whispered bitterly. “I'm even surprised the initial is there at all.”

Jesper’s fingers joined Wylan’s on the plaque, tracing the letters. “Gold lettering. No expense spared,” he commented, and a faint red glow emanated from his hand as he probed through the particles of the metal surface with his durast powers. “Hm. It's iron underneath, though,” he added, his analyzing touch moving to the side of the plaque, “and not even good iron… some expenses were spared, it seems.”

Wylan had never known himself to be claustrophobic, but the more time he spent in this crypt, the more he felt like his breathing was getting thin and short. The walls were closing in on him. “I wonder which one of those niches was meant for me,” he said, his gaze traveling over the numerous, dark and empty openings in the wall. “I wonder if I would have had an iron and gold plaque as well, or if my father was planning on leaving me to rot in the canal as an anonymous, unclaimed corpse.”

“Just so you know : I think there's a special place in hell for your father,” Jesper hissed between clenched teeth, “and I'm keeping one of my bullets especially for him.”

Wylan could almost appreciate the sentiment. “I don't think Kaz would let you kill his thirty-million-kruge cash cow,” he pointed out flatly.

Jesper let out a huff of frustration. “No. Probably not.”

The nails on the corner of his mother’s plaque appeared sturdy, and to have been driven deep into the stone. Wylan wondered how hard it would be to pry them off. It was probably impossible without proper tools, or without breaking the stone. Fortunately, he had Jesper. “Can you use your small science to remove it? The plaque?”

After a silent hesitation, and a shuffle of feet on the stone floor, Jesper asked : “Are you sure?”

No. Wylan wasn't sure what he was hoping to find on the other side; or what he wished to achieve. Making sure his mother was where she was supposed to be, and that no one had disturbed her eternal rest, perhaps? He just knew he had to look inside. This was his only certitude, no matter how absurd or irrational it might seem. “Can you remove it, please?” he insisted.

“Yes, the nails are pure iron. I should be able to manage without too much trouble,” Jesper relented, putting the lantern down on the floor. He applied both hands to the plaque, closed his eyes, and the muscles of his jaw tensed and flexed as he focused. The red glow escaped his palms and spreaded over the metal to the nails at each corner. Wylan watched, mesmerized, as the nails emerged from the holes, squirming like worms crawling out of an apple. They made clinking noises as they fell on the flagstones, all twisted and deformed. Jesper pulled a face. “I'm sorry. I'm not sure we're going to be able to put it back. We might have to ask for new nails….and Mr de Graaf's help.” He still pulled the plaque from the wall. It came with a swirl of stone dust that obscured everything for an instant.

At first, they saw nothing ; just a square of darkness through the wall. Then, Jesper took the lantern and lifted it to light the interior of the niche.

Wylan’s heart sunk. Even with the light filtering through the dust all the way down to the bottom of the niche, they saw nothing. Because there was absolutely nothing to see. No body wrapped in a shroud, no coffin, no urn. Nothing at all.

Nausea rose in Wylan’s throat, with a distinct taste of bile. His hands were going numb, cold and clammy.

Jesper managed to form words first. “Wylan….it's empty. There's nothing in it.”

Without a word, Wylan turned on his heels and ran out of the mausoleum. He could not stay there a single moment longer, or the ceiling would fall and crush him. His chest felt too tight, like there wasn't enough space in his ribcage for his lungs to expand. Outside, he collapsed to his knees in the wet, cold grass. He was not going to panic. He could not panic.

A few seconds later, Jesper was kneeling before him, holding Wylan’s shoulders, steadying him, encouraging him to breathe slowly and deeply.

“What does this mean, Jes!?” Wylan lamented, gripping Jesper's forearms so tightly he was perhaps going to make bruises. “Where is she? What happened to her?”

“I don't know, Wy. I don't know where she is.”

His father had taken everything from him, everything that ever mattered, even his mother’s body and the possibility to mourn her properly. Even that. He didn't want to cry ; he wanted to scream. He had this overwhelming need to kick, bite, and throw things. He wanted to run back to Ketterdam, to the Geldstraat, grab his father by the throat and yell in his face ; “WHAT DID YOU DO !!?? WHAT DID YOU DO TO HER!?” He didn't have that luxury… or even the courage to do it.

He took a long, deep breath to steady himself. He had gotten through worse. He could get through this.

Jesper framed his face between careful hands. “I'm sorry this is happening to you, right now, Wy. It’s terrible. It’s monstrous, really,” he said, his face twisted in pain and compassion. “But we're not going to sort this out tonight. You're obviously tired. This has been a lot. We should get rest, and then, tomorrow, we'll put our heads together and find a solution.”

“We?” Wylan wanted to ask. “Are you really in this with me? How long do we get?” He didn't voice it. He didn't quite feel like he had the right.

“You're right. It's late,” Wylan conceded, putting on the bravest face he could muster in the circumstances, and he let Jesper pull him up to his feet. It probably wasn't that late, in fact, but the toll of it all was pulling the marrow from his bones. He was tired, but, above all else, he needed the comfort of having his boyfriend close. It was possible he would only get one single night with Jesper. Or, perhaps, if he was lucky enough, Jesper would stay around a handful of days, before his loyalty to Kaz and the Crows would take him back to Ketterdam. And then what?

No. Wylan wasn't going to let his father take this away from him as well. He had Jesper tonight, and he would make the most of it. Tonight, he'd be happy, and Jan Van Eck could go rot in hell.

“Where are you lodging?” Jesper asked gently, his hand on the small of Wylan’s back : a tender, protective gesture. “Let’s go there.”

“It’s this way.”

***

At the far end of the cemetery, in the North West corner of the wall, stood a one storey stone building with a mossy slate roof, a chimney, and two small windows flanking a green wooden door. “Welcome to my humble abode,” Wylan announced, opening the door to let Jesper in.

The interior wasn't much to look at : a hearth with an old armchair next to it, a wood stove for cooking and a small kitchen sink, a wooden chest for clothes and linens, a sturdy table in the middle of the room, a single wire-frame bed in a corner, and shelves on the walls with various knick knacks on them. Still, it was cozy enough, and Jesper seemed to think so, because as Wylan put the lantern down on the table, he looked around and said: “It's cute. What's this place?”

Wylan used a match to transfer fire from the lantern to an old oil lamp. “It used to be the receiving vault, where they stored the bodies and coffins during winter, when the ground was too hard to dig.”

Jesper grimaced. “I take back what I said about it being cute.”

“Tobias bought a steam digger several years ago,” Wylan explained. He discarded his coat on the footrest of the bed, and squatted down by the fireplace to pile some kindling and pieces of dry planks over the cold ashes. “He can dig graves even in winter so they didn't need the space anymore. They converted it into a cottage for their son when he reached his late teens and wanted a private space, but now he’s gone to study at the naval academy in Lij, so Cornelia offered me to stay here.”

“And you don't mind that it used to contain cadavers?” Jesper asked, inspecting a sailship's model on one of the shelves.

“I don't really think about it, to be honest. I make sure to keep it tidy and clean, and when I'm off work, I can play my flute, and draw, and no one bothers me.” Wylan cracked a match and the kindling caught fire with a sputtering noise. “And the neighbors are very quiet,” he deadpanned.

“Ah!” Jesper exclaimed, acknowledging the attempt at dark humor. He grew thoughtful again in the span of a few seconds. “But don't you ever miss it?… I don't know… the action?”

Wylan placed two logs in the hearth with a shrug. “In time, perhaps I would, but I'm not like you, or Kaz. I'm not a born criminal. I don't need the schemes and the adrenaline.”

“But you're so good at it!”

“Hm,” was Wylan's only answer. He didn't deny he could be resourceful, and could make himself useful in a crisis on some occasions, but Kaz hadn't recruited him for his skill set. He had recruited him as a bargaining chip.

“Do you think this place is haunted?” Jesper asked, apparently growing bored of his exploration. He removed his top hat, and his holsters, left them on a chair, walked over to the table and sat on it.

Wylan shot him an incredulous look over his shoulder. “You don’t seriously believe that. Since when do you believe in ghosts?”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” Jesper countered, swinging his legs off the edge of the table as he watched Wylan work. “I believe in all sorts of things—ghosts, gnomes…true love.” His voice dropped on the last two words, adopting the honeyed baritone that always gave Wylan pleasant shivers.

Wylan stood up and approached Jesper, holding his gaze. He was like a reckless moth, drawn to that tall, lanky, devilishly handsome flame that burned as brightly as the fire in the hearth.

With an easy smile, Jesper spread his knees, inviting Wylan to settle between them.

Since Jesper's height was mostly legs, they were almost at eye level with one another. The deep brown color of his irises reminded Wylan of the mahogany wood of his mother’s grand piano. He took his time to detail Jesper’s square jaw, his high cheekbones dusted with faint freckles, and, of course, his lips—dark pink and velvety. Wylan knew for a fact they were as delicious as they looked.

“I was thinking about you when I fell asleep last night,” Wylan confessed, resting his hands on Jesper’s hips.

Jesper cocked his head to the side with a saucy grin. “You thought of me? Late at night? What was I wearing?”

Wylan didn’t quite take the bait. “I was thinking of the very first time I saw you at Club Cumulus.”

“Oh? Good first impression, I expect.”

“A bit of a mixbag, actually,” Wylan replied with a wince.“I thought you had the most beautiful lips I had ever seen, but I also wondered if my father had hired you to find and kill me.”

Jesper’s eyes widened at that.”You thought I was there to get rid of you?”

“Well, you had a reputation as a rather deadly sharpshooter,” Wylan pointed out, “and my father has a history of hiring Barrel thugs to do his dirty work. It was a reasonable assumption to make.”

“You thought I was there to eliminate you…and you still slept with me?”

Wylan scratched his temple with a chuckle and a self-conscious blush. “It wasn't my most clever move, I grant you that. But, in my defense, you turned out to be very charming and persuasive.”

“Ah. You found yourself impossibly enslaved to my erotic wiles,” Jesper said with a casual shrug. “Can't blame you for that. It happens all the time.” His eyes were half-lidded now, making him look exactly like the cat that got the cream. “So you loved my lips, huh?” he purred.

Reaching up, Wylan dragged a thumb across the seam of Jesper's mouth. As expected, the texture was to die for, and the sensation went straight to his groin. “I loved everything, but that's what stood out, yes.”

“Has your opinion of my mouth changed at all since then?”

“If anything, I think it has improved…”

“It's still all yours, my mouth,” Jesper pointed out, pulling Wylan in by the waist, “if you wish to repeat the experience.”

Jesper leaned in first, closing the distance. This kiss was different from the one they exchanged outside earlier. This one burned high, steady and sure. Jesper’s hands came up to cradle his face, and Wylan was utterly lost. He'd give anything for his boyfriend to keep kissing him like this, forever. He needed more, however ; more than just Jesper's lips ; soft, parted, and wet against his. His own body responded to the thought, and his hips nestled further between Jesper's thighs. Erections trapped in fabric brushed against each other. They moaned in sync, lips still locked.

They parted, just a thin sliver of air between them so Wylan could speak. “Jesper …are we going to make love tonight?”

“I sure hope to Ghezen we are,” Jesper replied with a breathy chuckle. “I want you more than you can possibly imagine.” He carded his fingers through the curls at the back of Wylan’s head. “But you have to want it too; otherwise it's not worth it.”

Wylan found anchorage at the nape of Jesper's neck. He rested his forehead on his boyfriend’s. “We don't know what will happen tomorrow. We don't know how long we've got.”

“No, we don't. But tonight, we're both here, and it's all that counts,” Jesper whispered. “Come to bed with me…please?”

“Yes,” Wylan said, low and soft like a vow. Perhaps they had not sorted out everything between them. Perhaps there was still some lingering hurt, but there was also peace to be made in the touching of skin, and he was ready to give in to the need for this.

Jesper captured his lips even more forcefully this time, and Wylan was ready to meet him with the same intensity. They barely broke their kiss as Jesper went back to his feet and they made their way to the bed. Wylan threw his arms around Jesper's neck and they stumbled together on the mattress, Jesper on top of him. He was deliciously heavy and firm. Wylan wrapped his legs around his narrow hips. He was dying to feel more; just more of him …everything.

They helped each other strip from their clothes as fast as they could, resenting any piece of fabric that deprived them from the feel of warm skin.

Jesper was sitting back, straddling Wylan's legs. He had just tossed Wylan's waistcoat off the bed and made his suspenders slip off his shoulders. He was in the process of unbuttoning Wylan's shirt when he stopped dead with a surprised “oh!” Slowly, he reached for something inside the shirt : a crudely made key hanging around Wylan’s neck from a leather lace.

Jesper inspected his own creation for a few seconds, tongue-tied, face softening with awe. “You kept it?”

“I did,” Wylan replied, swallowing thickly, with the absurd impression he had been caught doing something reprehensible. “I wanted to remember the fact you once cared about me enough to make something like this.”

Jesper placed the key back to Wylan's sternum, in order to reach up and cup his face with his long-fingered hands. “Darling…of course I cared, and I still do. I'm sorry I made you doubt it. Like Inej likes to occasionally remind me: I have this bad tendency to shoot from the hip. I speak and act before I think. I'm sorry you got caught in that crossfire.”

Wylan ran his hand up and down Jesper's arm in reassurance. “I get why you were angry. You had reasons to.”

“Perhaps, but I know I hurt you, and I don't want to hide from that responsibility.”

Sitting up, Wylan looped his arms around Jesper's waist and locked his gaze with his. “I forgive you, Jes,” he said confidently. “Do you think you can forgive me too, for keeping parts of my life from you?”

“Oh, Mpenzi,” Jesper breathed, his voice full of warmth. “I forgave you weeks ago.” He pulled Wylan closer for a brief but incredibly tender kiss. When they pulled apart, a mischievous glint tugged at the corner of his smile. “And you’ll be even more forgiven if you help me out of these clothes so I can hold you.”

“I don’t think it works that way,” Wylan teased with a roll of his eyes. But he was already shrugging off his own shirt and reaching for Jesper’s buttons to help him out of his.

When Jesper’s shirt joined Wylan’s on the floor, Wylan noticed the blue and green silk neckerchief tied around Jesper's wrist. “I recognize this,” he said. “But it’s supposed to be worn around your neck, you know?”

Jesper shook his head with a smile. “I don’t think the same rule applies when it becomes a lucky charm.” He untied it, placing it around Wylan’s neck instead, securing it with a loose knot, careful not to tighten it too much.
“It’s yours, though,” Jesper added. “It was a gift. You can have it back, as long as you promise to wear it from time to time.”

Wylan hesitated as he stroked the silk around his neck. “I wouldn’t want to deprive you of your lucky charm.”
Jesper’s hands returned to Wylan’s face, cradling it with gentle, reverent care. “I don’t need one when I’ve got you.” The depth of affection in his gaze was so sincere that Wylan sucked in a breath, caught by the unexpected joy of it.

“Saints…. I love you so much, Wylan.”

The words were like an apparition, like some fantastical creatures Wylan couldn’t quite believe existed—at least, not for him. “You do? You love me?” His voice cracked as he asked, needing to be sure.

“I do. I really do,” Jesper confirmed. “I’ve been meaning to tell you ever since I arrived, but so much happened tonight that I kind of forgot to say it.” He made a sheepish face. “It’s not the best, is it? Forgetting to tell your boyfriend you’re in love with him?”

Wylan couldn’t bring himself to resent the awkward timing. His chaotic, brave, marvelous Jesper—his sweet disaster, his beautiful scoundrel—loved him. Of all the boys in the world, he had chosen Wylan. What a wondrous thing! He hadn’t given up on him. They hadn’t given up on each other, in the end. Whenever they stumbled apart, they always found their way back to one another. And every time, they were stronger for it. Wylan wanted to hold fast and never let go.

Somehow, the answer came as easily as breathing. “I love you too, Jes. The first time I laid my eyes on you, I think part of me already knew you'd have my heart, no matter how dangerous it'd be for me to give it to you.”

Maybe Wylan ought not to love him. Both their futures were so uncertain, but he didn't want to lie to Jesper anymore, about anything, and not telling him about his own feelings would have been a lie of omission.

They lost themselves in more kissing, and caressing; lips over lips, hands over hips, and chest, and neck, and shoulders.

This. To be kissing Jesper, and for Jesper to be kissing back, fully and openly, without restraint, with his heart hammering against Wylan's own chest… Neither of them could have imagined anything better. Wylan's entire being was filled with so much desire that his body felt too narrow a vessel to contain it all.

Wylan let his fingers get tangled into the lovely mass of Jesper's coily hair, scratching his scalp and feeling him shiver in response. He could keep his hands in that thick hair for all eternity and be content.

They pulled apart long enough to discard any remaining piece of clothing, and soon enough, Wylan had Jesper on his back on the bed, every inch of him offered to his eyes. He straddled Jesper's thighs and took in the view. After a month of solitary nights and starvation, that man was a feast for the eyes.

Seeing Jesper like this before him ; proudly, thickly, gorgeously erect, it made flames of lust lick the base of Wylan's spine, spreading all the way up his body. He placed his hand over Jesper’s hips, rubbing the hollows of his hip bones with his thumbs. Oh, how he had missed that beautiful body.

Judging by the frankly hungry gaze Jesper was raking over his own shape in the low, shuddering light of the fireplace, the feeling was entirely mutual. He reached up and let his hand roam over Wylan's shoulder and chest: each touch an unspoken compliment. “You’ve been filling up quite nicely over the past few weeks, merchling,” he commented, appreciative.

Wylan didn't mind the nickname that much. Maybe from Kaz, or someone else, it would've rubbed him the wrong way, but there was nothing but love and want in Jesper's use of the word. Besides, he knew that, contrary to all of the other men he had ever slept with, Jesper didn't want him because he was a Van Eck. He wanted him for the person he was, without compromise.

“You're not so bad yourself, sharpshooter.”

Jesper closed his eyes when Wylan leaned down and kissed the beauty mark over his left eyebrow. Then, Wylan's lips visited the small scar on his right cheekbone, the other beauty spot on his left jawline, the one on his throat just next to his Adam's apple, the one underneath his right collarbone, then, finally, put his lips to the birthmark just underneath the right pectoral. All of those little details that made Jesper unique; Wylan wanted to commit all of them to memory… just in case.

Wylan moved a little higher, and, unable to resist, he drew a dark nipple between his lips. Not every man liked the sensation, but Jesper rewarded his efforts by arching his back off the mattress with a moan. Wylan smiled against the areola at his encouraging reaction. He sucked gently before circling the hardening nub with his tongue and felt Jesper writhe with pleasure. He moved to the other nipple; giving it the same treatment.

Jesper moaned again, and Wylan breathed in the subtle scent of manly musk on his skin, the floral, spicy one of jurda, and the sharp, metallic and smoky one of gunpowder. It was all so intoxicating already. Desire was pulsing between his legs and at the core of his stomach, demanding to be liberated and sated.

Drowsy and a little elated, Jesper was chuckling to himself as Wylan trailed kisses from the base of his sternum, down his stomach, only stopping a few seconds to dip the tip of his tongue into his navel, just for the pleasure of having him squirm on the mattress. He nuzzled the slight trail of dark, coarse hair leading further down.

“Gorgeous,” Wylan whispered against the taut skin of Jesper's cock. He kissed the tip: a wet and gentle press of lips, enjoying the sounds Jesper made, and the feel of him; so alive and aroused under his mouth. He licked a broad stripe up the hard length, collecting the moisture at the end with a few swirls of tongue. The scent there, between Jesper's legs, was unapologetically male, and Wylan’s own need was becoming overwhelming.

“Can I take you in my mouth?”

“Yes! Please do.” It came out of Jesper as a plea, whether that was conscious or not.

Wylan obeyed, closing his lips around the head and drawing him deeper. He had missed the taste of him, and it felt so good to have Jesper fill his mouth and his senses once again.

“Oh saints,” Jesper rasped, spine arching again, and screwing his eyes shut, as if unsure if he was going to survive it, but wanting it anyway.

It didn't take long before Wylan could feel Jesper’s cock getting noticeably thicker and harder from the work of his lips and tongue. Jesper’s self-control was fraying as he rolled his hips subconsciously, fucking his lover's willing mouth. “Ghezen! You’re driving me crazy,” Jesper lamented.

Wylan drew away and sat back on his heels over Jesper’s shins, tearing a gasp of protest from him at the loss of sensation. He placed a hand over his man’s cock, just covering it, and he ran his thumb up and down the wet, sensitive shaft, marveling at the incredibly silky texture, the heaviness and thickness of it. It twitched against his palm, responding to his touch.

Jesper whined again when Wylan interrupted the caress. Instead of resuming it, however, Wylan took Jesper’s right hand, which was clutching the bedsheets, and placed it over Jesper’s own rigid cock.

Jesper cracked an eye open with a questioning look.

“Remember that time when we had sex on the king’s own daybed?” Wylan said. “You promised that at some point, you’d touch yourself for me, and that I could watch my fill.”

A wolfish smile appeared on Jesper’s face. “I did say that, yes.” He closed his fingers around himself and gave a few, deliberate strokes. “You have an excellent memory.”

Wylan’s breath quickened and his mouth watered at the sight. “What if you touched yourself…” he suggested, leaning down and putting his mouth so close to Jesper’s ear that his lips were brushing against the shell of it. “…while I’m buried deep inside you…”

“Fuck, Wylan!” Jesper exclaimed, his grip tightening all of a sudden, as if to prevent himself from spending right away just from the effect of Wylan's words.

That knowledge filled Wylan with a sense of power that got his blood pumping. “You would like that, wouldn't you?” he whispered in Jesper's ear. “You’d love to put on a nice show just for me, and let me see how pretty you are when you’re making yourself come while I'm using you for my own pleasure.”

“Yes. Yes please,” Jesper begged, breathless.

Wylan wasn't in any hurry, however. He wanted to tend to Jesper’s needs first, and make sure he was sufficiently prepared to receive him.

“You can keep your hand on yourself, then, but only light touches,” Wylan instructed. “You have to be patient while I'm making sure this will be good for you.”

Jesper made a throaty sound that was part-frustration, part-anticipation, but did as he was bade.

Wylan left the bed just long enough to put another log in the fire, so they'd stay warm even without blankets, and to fetch a bottle of lubricant from his satchel.

When he came back to the bed, he prompted Jesper to lift his hips so he could place a pillow in the curve of his back. Then, he pushed Jesper's knees up and back, exposing him. His hands moved down the length of the brown-skinned thighs, to the lean, round buttocks, cupping a feel of that perfect ass. He allowed himself to caress the nice curve of it, and to relish in the sensation of stamina-packed muscles under the plush skin. Then Wylan pushed his thumb to the fluttering, responsive and sensitive muscles of the entrance. He gently circled it, applying just enough pressure to allow it to relax.

With a helpless whimper, Jesper accelerated the work of his hand on his straining cock.

“Not too much just yet,” Wylan reminded him.

“But it's evil!” Jesper whined. Despite his protest, he obeyed and his hand stilled to a light grip, even though it seemed to ask for more self-control than he could give. The trail of hair underneath his navel was damp with fresh sweat, showing the effort he had to make to contain the instinctual need for quick pleasure and release.

“I know, but you've been doing so good,” Wylan soothed. He coated two fingers with some of the bottle's content, and was pleased to feel Jesper's body easily yield and accept them. “And you look so amazing like this. I could watch you for hours.”

Jesper bit his lower lip hard to suppress a curse. “Please, tell me you're not planning on leaving me like this for hours.”

“I’m not,” Wylan assured his boyfriend, removing his fingers. “Do you want me inside you now, treasure?”

“I already wanted that half an hour ago,” Jesper groaned. “Now It's just torture.”

“I'm sorry, precious.” When Wylan used the lubricant on his own cock, his legs trembled from relief. He had been so focused on Jesper that he had been neglecting himself.

“You should be,” Jesper said without real venom; just a good dose of desire and impatience.
He folded his legs on each side of Wylan’s lean hips, allowing him to settle between them. “Please,” he begged again, fucking the loose grip of his fist, his eyes feverishly searching for Wylan's.

“I’m here,” Wylan reassured him in a whisper, and finally, he was breaching Jesper, penetrating him slowly and carefully.

They both gasped, overwhelmed at first; Jesper from the intrusion, and Wylan from the silky warmth engulfing him. Wylan braced himself on his hands, bracketing Jesper's waist, his eyes unfocused and his vision veiled with pleasure. “You're exquisite, love. So tight. So welcoming,” he rasped.

Jesper relaxed and gave himself up to the sensation, his body accepting Wylan on instinct, and trusting him implicitly when he started moving with a slow roll of his hips. Jesper threw his head back, eyes shut for a moment, moaning loud and free, and bearing his throat as a gesture of trust. Wylan lowered himself upon him and kissed him there, biting and sucking at his pulse point.

“Wylan! I need more!” Jesper begged him. “I don't care if it doesn't last long. I need this …need you…please! You feel so good, love. You feel so fucking good!”

Frantic breaths and moans were tumbling from both their mouths at that point.

Wylan found firm purchase on his lover’s hip with one hand, bracing himself with the other on his chest, and he followed Jesper’s lead, setting a rougher, more rapid rhythm. Jesper thrashed his head into the pillow as bliss soared to incredible heights, meeting each and every one of Wylan's movements. Pleasure was rolling over Wylan in successive waves too, reaching new peaks with every push of his hips. Jesper was working himself in tandem, between their stomachs sleek with sweat, chasing his release.

Jesper tensed up with a helpless shout, spending all over himself. This was more than Wylan could handle, and it sent him over the edge at once.

Once the eruption of pleasure had swept him away thoroughly, he collapsed on Jesper's body, not caring about the mess it would make on their skins. He just needed his man.

Wylan left a trail of lazy kisses to the side of Jesper's neck, in no hurry to move. In response, Jesper wrapped his arms and legs around Wylan, not wanting to forsake the connection just yet.

“Holy.mother.of.saints,” Jesper stammered when he finally found his breath, almost in disbelief, like someone who can't quite process what had just happened. Wylan couldn't blame him. He very much shared the sentiment.

Wylan reached for his face with gentle fingers, brushing back a few delicate coils of hair that had fallen over Jesper’s forehead. “Look at you.”

“Nah, it's you I'm looking at,” Jesper countered, grazing Wylan’s cheek with the back of his hand. “...my sìobhragan.”

“What’s that?”

“They're magical woodland sprites from kaelish folklore,” Jesper explained with a drowsy smile, looking entirely too smitten.

Wylan rested a heavy head on Jesper's shoulder, drawing a long exhale. “I feel like I've so much to learn.”

“You've been kaelish for less than three hours, love. Give yourself time.”

They basked in each other's warmth and the feel of shared heartbeats for a while, until the position was getting uncomfortable and the need to clean became urgent.

The water coming from outside through the kitchen pump was icy cold, but they had nothing better to wash with. After much shivering and cursing, they were clean enough to settle together in the armchair in front of the hearth, soaking in the heat from the fire. They wrapped themselves together in a wool blanket, Wylan curled up in Jesper's lap.

Now that he was warm again, an amorous, content and sated feeling was purring low in Wylan's belly, threatening to bloom into desire again, but his mind kept coming back to a comment Jesper had made earlier in the day. “When you apologized to me in the cemetery,” he observed thoughtfully, “you called yourself a hypocrite. Why?”

Heaving a deep sigh, Jesper worried his lip between his teeth for a few reluctant seconds before he spoke up. “This is the thing I wanted to tell you about, actually. The thing is, I can hardly judge you for having hidden things about your own family, since I’ve also omitted to tell you certain things about my own father, for fear that you'd think less of me if you found out.”

Wylan’s heart sank. What had Jesper's father done to him? Did it have anything to do with Jesper wanting to keep his grisha powers a secret? Instead of making assumptions, Wylan kept his arms around Jesper’s neck, holding him close, and letting him explain everything while he stared into the flames dancing in the hearth.

By the end of his tale, Jesper was grim and shamefaced. “You must think I'm a terrible person.”

“What I think is…” Wylan began carefully, trying to find the right words. “What I think is that you don't need me to point out the bad decisions you've made. You’re sufficiently smart to know right from wrong. Besides, you probably feel enough guilt from it already without needing me to add to it.” He heaved a long sigh. “I think you're a good person with an addiction that should be addressed, for your own sake and not only for your father's.”

“Yes. Yes, you’re right.” Jesper rested his head back over the chair, looking up at the low ceiling. “I'm trying to do better, though. I haven't gambled at all for a month now.”

Wylan kissed his cheek. “I'm proud of you.”

“Thank you,” Jesper said under his breath. “And I've written a letter to my dad too, telling him everything. I haven't had the time to post it yet, because…Kaz…but I will.”

Holding Jesper a fraction tighter, feeling protective, Wylan chewed the inside of his bottom lip before he asked. “What will your father do when he finds out?”

“He'll be angry, no doubt. He'll probably come all the way here from Novyi Zem to strongly disapprove of my actions.”

“That….That's all?”

“Yeah, probably. It's bad enough already, though,” Jesper replied with a wince. He gave Wylan a questioning look. “Why are you asking?”

Wylan didn't reply. He was biting the side of his thumb now, lost in thoughts. If he ever caused his father to lose any significant amount of money, he didn't even want to think what kind of punishment would have been inflicted on him for that crime.

“Wylan?”

“Hm?”

“What does your father do when he's angry?”

“He….strongly disapproves of me.”

“With his fists?”

Wylan didn't dare looking at his boyfriend. He kept his eyes on the burning logs instead. “Sometimes, yeah. He had one of the tutors use a horse whip too.”

Jesper’s hands were on his jawline at once, prompting him to turn his head so their eyes met. “Listen,” Jesper began, low and serious. “Your father is an absolute wanker, and you, Wylan Van Eck, are a fucking marvel. You never, even for one second, deserved anything that man inflicted upon you. I hope you know that.”

Wylan swallowed around the lump in his throat. “I'm trying to do better for myself, but I'm so tired of being scared,” he admitted.

“I think you're bloody brave and resilient. If my own father had made my mother disappear, and then tried to have me killed, I would be spiraling out of control a lot more than you are right now, believe me.”

“The only reason I’m staying mostly sane is because you're here.” He snuggled closer and rested his head on Jesper's shoulder. “I don't know what I'd do without you, Jes.”

Jesper stroked Wylan's flank, and the length of the leg folded over his lap. “You'd manage. You're so smart and clever.”

“What if I don't want to do it without you, though?” Wylan said with quiet fervor.

“Nor I, my love,” Jesper assured him, pressing a kiss to the crown of Wylan's head, “but you know I can't stay here in Saint-Hilde, and I feel like it's not my place to ask you to come back to Ketterdam with me, knowing it puts you within your father's grasp.”

Wylan slipped his hand under the blanket and he closed his fingers around his boyfriend’s arm, as if feeling the sinews and muscles there could give him additional strength. “I can't stay here either. If you and Kaz were able to track me down, that means he can too,” Wylan observed. His father would be absolutely enraged when he’d learn that someone had hired one of the best lawyers in Ketterdam to insure that the kaelish people would be walking free. The Van Eck estate had unlimited funds to hire private inquiry agents and discover who was behind it. It was only a matter of time before they’d close in on Wylan. The only blessing was that Jan still thought his son was too stupid to pull off something like this. It would maybe slow him down a little bit. Being chronically underestimated had its perks. “I should get out of the country, at least until the legal situation regarding the céilí plays itself out.”

“Where would you go?”

“I don't know,” Wylan breathed, although there might be only one logical answer at that point. He had an opportunity to go somewhere his father would never think to look. He’d be in incredible danger there, but, at least, not from his own family. Wylan took a deep breath and set his teeth against the obvious conclusion. “Kaz must be expecting you to bring me back to Ketterdam to participate in the heist at the Ice Court.”

“Yeah, he likely does,” Jesper agreed. “He hasn't given me any specific instruction in that sense, but he knows too well that deep down, I want you with the Crows…and by my side. He must be expecting that I'll try and convince you to travel back with me to the city.” He pinched his lips, resisting the urge to bounce his knee. His inner conflict wasn't hard to fathom.

“The problem is that Kaz thinks he can use me as insurance, but my father doesn't give a toss if I live or die,” Wylan reflected. “Most likely, he’d prefer the latter. But I've still got something Kaz needs. I went to Fjerda with my father a few years ago. He was invited to the Ice Court. Nina’s convinced Matthias won't cooperate willingly against his own country, and if that's the case, Kaz will need someone to make sure Matthias doesn't lead us astray. I have an excellent memory… and I can draw maps…”

He couldn't miss the way Jesper's eyes brightened at the prospect of Wylan participating in the heist. His heart tightened at the sight of it : both because he wanted to make Jesper happy, and also because this job had all the makings of a suicide mission. “In exchange,” Wylan went on, “I want Kaz to help me find out what happened to my mother. I reckon he'd agree, because this is also something he can use against my father, if need be. If he can prove Jan Van Eck is guilty of actual murder, or any other serious crime, it would make an even better leverage. A lot of my father's business dealings depend on his good reputation.”

Jesper's fingertips drummed over Wylan's thigh as he thought. “If anyone can uncover dirt on Jan Van Eck, it's Kaz,” he observed. “He’d need Inej’s help, of course, but they've already burgled the Van Eck mansion once. They can do it again.”

Wylan's eyes widened. “They…stole something inside the house? What? When?”

“A painting, about six months ago,” Jesper answered with a shrug. “I wasn't with them that night. I don't know the details.”

“The De Kappel,” Wylan whispered. “Ghezen! … Father was livid! He thought his security measures were infallible.” Jan had fired half of his security staff the morning after the burglary, and hired brand new guards the next day.

“Yeah. Kaz usually takes that sort of thing as a challenge,” Jesper said with some fondness. “That’s why I think that if you want to uncover the truth, Kaz might be your best hope.”

Wylan had to resign himself to the idea of having to sell his soul to Kaz Brekker once again.

Jesper reached inside the blanket and plucked the key around Wylan’s neck between his finger and thumb. “It seems like we’re going back to Ketterdam, then.” He didn't quite manage to conceal the relief in his voice.

“I guess we are.”

“We’re not going back tonight, though. This night is ours.” He let go of the key and caressed the side of Wylan’s neck with his knuckles. “Until tomorrow, it's just you and I, and I intended on making the best of it; make up for every night I didn't have you in my bed.”

A small smile creased the corner of Wylan's mouth. “It's a tall order.”

“Oh it is,” Jesper agreed, and without warning, he scooped Wylan up and lifted him in his arms as he rose from the chair. “That's why we should get back to it right away.”

“Jesper Fahey! Put me down!” Wylan protested, kicking his feet, laughter bubbling in his chest unexpectedly as he was carried across the room towards the bed.

“No! I'm not!” Jesper professed. “I'm never letting you go!”

***
Wylan stared down at his socks, shifting his weight from foot to foot, a pang of guilt twisting in his chest. “I'm sorry, Cornelia. I know this isn't ideal.”

He stood in the middle of the De Graafs’ parlor, Jesper at his side. Tobias and Cornelia had offered them breakfast, but Jesper was eager to catch the morning train to Ketterdam. In an ideal world, Wylan wouldn’t have had to resign on such short notice, but delaying the inevitable didn’t seem to make sense either.

Cornelia removed her spectacles and cleaned the lenses with her apron before putting them back on. “I’m disappointed, of course,” she said, her tone soft. “We loved having you here. But when I saw your handsome man appear through the fog”—she gave Jesper a conspiratorial chin gesture—“it was clear you had something waiting for you out there. I knew you weren’t here to stay.”

“I’m going back to the city to be with Jesper, it’s true,” Wylan agreed. “But I also need to get to the bottom of what happened with my mother.”

Jesper gave Wylan’s shoulder a silent squeeze in support.

“We understand,” Tobias signed with a benevolent nod.

“Yes, it’s important,” Cornelia echoed, her voice thick with sympathy. The De Graafs had been appalled when they learned that Marya’s body was missing. Body snatchers were always a threat, but there had never been a case in Cornelia’s three generations of family history where an otherwise sealed tomb had been found empty.
Wylan swayed slightly on his feet. “I could give you some money,” he offered, his voice tight. “To hire more than one worker since I’m leaving so suddenly.” He still had plenty from the Ravkan job—more than he needed. “If I can help in any way…”

Cornelia shook her head, dismissing the offer with a wave of her hand. “That’s very sweet of you, Wylan, but there’s no need. Mrs. Jansen’s been nagging me to hire her twins for months now. They’re not the sharpest tools in the shed, but they’ll get the job done.”

Jesper squeezed his shoulder again. “We have to go, Mpenzi,” he reminded Wylan softly. “The train leaves at ten bells. If we miss it, we’ll have to wait for the night train.”

Wylan’s throat constricted as unexpected tears threatened to rise. Cornelia and Tobias had been so good to him—kind, patient, and accepting in every way. For a time, he had filled the void in their lives, a surrogate son of sorts, a presence that softened the absence of their own child. Only now did it hit him: Mr. and Mrs. De Graaf had perhaps been the closest thing to real, supportive parents he’d known for a long, long time.

“Thank you,” Wylan signed, pressing his hand flat over his chin and extending it toward them both. He repeated the gesture three times, hoping they ‘d understand the depth of his gratitude.

Tobias stepped forward and pulled Wylan into a bear hug. Wylan clenched his teeth, fighting back the tears as he returned the embrace.

Cornelia patted Wylan’s arm with a watery smile when her husband let him go. The couple stood in the doorway of their cottage, waving as Jesper and Wylan made their way down the road toward the train station.

When they turned the corner to head into town and lost sight of the cottage and the cemetery gate, Wylan slipped his hand into his boyfriend’s. Jesper laced their fingers together and hoisted the strap of the leather satchel higher up on his shoulder. Wylan could have carried his own bag easily, light as it was with his few belongings packed inside, but Jesper has insisted on extending this gesture of gallantry.

A small, cawing murder of crows flew overhead, heading east. Wylan watched them until they disappeared behind the slanted roof of a large, grey-stone building that took pride of place along the main straat. Ivy climbed all the way to the third floor of the Saint-Hilde Sanatorium. Not a single light or sign of life showed through the windows. "Another kind of mausoleum, but for the living," Wylan murmured with a shudder.

Jesper followed his gaze. "This place looks like something out of a nightmare."

"It reeks of loneliness," Wylan agreed. "I wouldn't want to be stuck there."

"As opposed to living in a cottage that used to be a corpse vault?" Jesper teased.

"At least I could leave whenever I wanted," Wylan replied, gesturing toward the bars on the windows.

They walked past the sanatorium, and before long, they reached the train station, just in time—five minutes to spare before the train pulled into the platform. Wylan approached the controller and paid for the tickets, since Jesper was down to his last kruge.

Their second-class carriage was mostly empty, and they had a compartment to themselves. Wylan sat by the window, while Jesper shrugged off his coat, tossing it onto the opposite bench, then carefully placed his top hat beside it. He stowed Wylan's satchel in the overhead compartment before sitting next to him—hip to hip, shoulder to shoulder—despite there being plenty of space on his side of the bench. Wylan didn't mind; he shared the same need for proximity.

The train jolted awake like a serpent roused from sleep and began to move.

Jesper rolled up his shirt sleeves, exposing his forearms, and cleared his throat as if about to pass judgment. "There's something else I forgot to tell you. Something important," he said, preemptively. "Something that might change the way you see me."

Wylan's heart skipped as the train picked up speed. "What is it?"

Jesper's face lost all seriousness and he scrunched up his nose. "My middle name is 'Llewellyn.'"

"What?" Wylan asked, dumbfounded. He had expected any kind of revelation, but not this.

"Yes: my full name is Jesper Llewellyn Fahey. It's embarrassing, but it's true," Jesper admitted, running a hand through his hair. "And now you know everything there is to know about me. No other sordid secrets left between us."

"Percival," Wylan blurted out in return. "Wylan Percival Van Eck."

Jesper's grin only widened. "Aww! Percy!"

Heat rushed to Wylan's cheeks. "Please don’t call me that. If you do, I’m telling the others about ‘Llewellyn.’"

Jesper clutched the fabric of his waistcoat over his heart, mouth dropping open in mock outrage. "You wouldn’t dare!"

Wylan narrowed his eyes. "Watch me."

"Fine! I surrender," Jesper relented with a dramatic flourish. "I'll keep your secret if you keep mine."
"Agreed."

They hooked their pinky fingers to seal the promise, then pretended to spit on the floor, like a couple of kids on the playground.

Silence settled over the compartment. Wylan gazed out the window at the rolling Kerch hills and sprawling farmlands. When the train slowed and stopped at the Runderen station, their pinky fingers were still locked, their hands resting on Jesper's thigh. Wylan glanced down at the proof of the silly little promise they’d made, a bond of living flesh and delicate bones. His gaze drifted up Jesper's forearm, tracing the crow and cup tattoo etched into his brown skin.

"Do you think Kaz will make me get a tattoo like yours?" Wylan asked, out of the blue.

"Not unless you want one. Inej doesn’t have it."

Wylan wondered how a tattoo would look on his pale skin. It would definitely stand out. His father would be appalled if he saw Wylan inked like a true Barrel gangster. Strangely, that thought made it all the more tempting. Of course, he'd have to survive long enough to find a tattoo artist…

“Kaz’s plan to get into the Ice Court—it’s going to be absolutely insane, isn’t it?”

Jesper nodded without hesitation, a wide grin splitting his face. “Yes, most likely. But it’s going to be so much fun!” he beamed.

“We have very different ideas of fun,” Wylan groaned in response. He wasn’t exactly scared of the prospect, but he couldn’t say he relished it either—not to the extent Jesper did, at least. He was looking forward to seeing Nina again, though, and Inej… and even Kaz, oddly enough. He had to admit he was curious about meeting Nina’s Druskelle too. Jesper had said he was big and tall, and pretty impressive. That was definitely intriguing.

In the end, Wylan wasn’t dreading returning to the beastly belly of Ketterdam as much as he had expected. His father could still kill him, of course, but Wylan was now convinced that Jan Van Eck would never be able to cage him again—not in the way he had before. The reason was simple: he had tasted true freedom. He had experienced the freedom to be angry, to talk back, and to defend himself; the freedom to be brave about certain things and afraid of others; to have limitations and weaknesses, yet still be proud of his strengths and accomplishments. He had tasted the freedom of setting boundaries and tearing down walls. He had friendships, love, and sex. He could demand respect and consideration.

Wylan could be Wylan Van Eck if he chose, or Wylan Hendriks, or even Wylan MacAndrick—if he ever figured out how to be the latter. In any case, he wasn’t the boy who had stepped onto that ship to Belendt all those months ago.

“Are you alright?” Jesper asked softly, noticing the intense arch of Wylan’s brows.

With a soft exhale, Wylan relaxed. He rested his head against Jesper’s shoulder and closed his eyes as the train engine purred, pushing ahead onto the tracks once more.

“Yeah. I will be alright.”